THE ADVENTURER: N ^o 90.

NOTHING sooner quells the ridiculous tri­umph of human vanity, than reading those passages of the greatest writers in which they seem deprived of that noble spirit that inspires them in other parts; and where, instead of invention and grandeur, we meet with nothing but flatness and insipidity.

The pain I have felt in observing a lofty genius thus sink beneath itself, has often made me wish [Page 2] that these unworthy stains could be blotted from their works, and leave them perfect and immaculate.

I went to bed a few nights ago full of these thoughts, and closed the evening, as I frequently do, with reading a few lines of Virgil. I acci­dentally opened that part of the sixth book; where Anchises recounts to his son the various methods of purgation which the soul undergoes in the next world, to cleanse it from the filth it has contracted by its connections with the body, and to deliver the pure aetherial essence from the vicious tincture of mortality. This was so much like my evening's speculation, that it insensibly mixed and incorpo­rated with it, and as soon as I fell asleep formed it­self into the following dream.

I found myself in an instant in the midst of a temple, which was built with all that magnificent simplicity, that distinguishes the productions of the ancients. At the East end was raised an altar, on each side of which stood a priest who seemed pre­paring to sacrifice. On the altar was kindled a fire, from which arose the brightest flame I had ever beheld. The light which it dispensed, though re­markably strong and clear, was not quivering and dazzling, but steady and uniform, and diffused a purple radiance through the whole edifice, not un­like the first appearance of the morning.

[Page 3]While I stood fixed in admiration, my attention was awakened by the blast of a trumpet that shook the whole temple; but it carried a certain sweet­ness in its sound, which mellowed and tempered the natural shrillness of that instrument. After it had sounded thrice, the Being who blew it, ha­bited according to the description of Fame by the ancients, issued a proclamation to the following purpose. ‘"By command of Apollo and the Mu­ses, all who have ever made any pretensions to fame by their writings are enjoined to sacrifice upon the altar in this temple those parts of their works, which have hitherto been preserved to their infamy; that their names may descend spotless and unsullied to posterity. For this purpose Aristotle and Longinus are appointed chief priests, who are to see that no improper oblations are made, and no proper ones con­cealed; and, for the more easy performance of this office, they are allowed to chuse as their assistants whomsoever they shall think worthy of the function."’

As soon as this proclamation was made I turned my eyes with inexpressible delight towards the two priests; but was soon robbed of the plea­sure of looking at them by a croud of people [Page 4] running up to offer their service. These I found to be a groupe of French criticks; but their offers were rejected by both priests with the utmost indig­nation, and their whole works were thrown on the altar, and reduced to ashes in an instant. The two priests then looked round, and chose with a few others Horace and Quintilian from among the Romans, and Addison from the English, as their principal assistants.

The first who came forward with his offering, by the loftiness of his demeanor was soon discovered to be Homer. He approached the altar with great majesty, and delivered to Longinus those parts of his Odyssey, which have been censured as improba­ble fictions, and the ridiculous narratives of old age. Longinus was preparing for the sacrifice; but observing that Aristotle did not seem willing to assist him in the office, he returned them to the venerable old bard with great deference, saying that ‘"they were indeed the tales of old age, but it was the old age of Homer."’

Virgil appeared next, and approached the altar with a modest dignity in his gait and counte­nance peculiar to himself, and to the surprise of all committed his whole Aeneid to the flames. But it was immediately rescued by two Romans, who ran [Page 5] with precipitation to the altar, delivered the poem from destruction, and carried off the author between them, repeating that glorious boast of about forty lines at the beginning of the third Georgick.

After him most of the Greek and Roman authors proceeded to the altar, and surrendered with great modesty and humility the most faulty part of their works. One circumstance was observable; that the sacrifice always increased, in proportion as the author had ventured to deviate from a judicious imitation of Homer. The latter Roman authors, who seemed almost to have lost sight of him, made so large offerings, that some of their works, which were before very voluminous, shrunk into the compass of a primer.

It gave me the highest satisfaction to see philo­sophy thus cleared from erroneous principles, history purged of falsehood, poetry of fustian, and nothing left in each but genius, sense and truth. I marked with particular attention the several offerings of the most eminent English writers. Chaucer gave up his obscenity, and then delivered [Page 6] his works to Dryden to clear them from the rubbish that encumbered them. Dryden executed his task with great address, and, as Addison says of Virgil in his Georgicks, ‘"tossed about his dung with an air of gracefulness."’ He not only repaired the injuries of time, but threw in a thousand new graces. He then advanced towards the altar himself, and delivered up a large paquet which contained many plays, and some poems. The paquet had a label affixed to it which bore this in­scription, ‘"To Poverty."’

Shakespeare carried to the altar a long string of puns marked ‘"The taste of the age,"’ a small par­cel of bombast, and a pretty large bundle of in­correctness. Notwithstanding the ingenuous air with which he made this offering, some officiates at the altar accused him of concealing certain pieces, and mentioned the London Prodigal, Sir Thomas Cromwell, the Yorkshire Tragedy, &c. The poet replied, that ‘"as those pieces were unworthy to be preserved, he should see them consumed to ashes with great pleasure, but that he was wholly in­nocent of their original."’ The two chief priests interposed in this dispute, and dismissed the poet with many compliments; Longinus observing that the pieces in question could not possibly be his, for [Page 7] that the failings of Shakespeare were like those of Homer, ‘"whose genius, whenever it subsided, might be compared to the ebbing of the ocean, which left a mark upon its shores to shew to what a height it was sometimes carried."’ Aristotle concurred in this opinion, and added ‘"that although Shakespeare was quite ignorant of that exact oeconomy of the stage, which is so remarkable in the Greek writers, yet the meer strength of his genius had in many points car­ried him infinitely beyond them."’

Milton gave up a few errors in his Paradise Lost, and the sacrifice was attended with great de­cency by Addison. Otway and Rowe threw their comedies upon the altar, and Beaumont and Fletcher the two last acts of many of their pieces. They were followed by Tom Durfey, Etherege, Wycherley, and several other dramatic writers, who made such large contributions that they set the altar in a blaze.

Among these I was surprized to see an author, with much politeness in his behaviour and spirit in his countenance, tottering under an unwieldy burden. As he approached I discovered him to be Sir John Vanbrugh, and could not but smile, when [Page 8] on his committing his heavy load to the flames, it proved to be ‘"his skill in architecture."’

Pope advanced towards Addison, and delivered with great humility those lines written expressly against him, so remarkable for their excellence and their cruelty, repeating this couplet;

The ingenious critick insisted on his taking them again, ‘"for"’ said he ‘"my associates at the altar, particularly Horace, would never permit a line of so excellent a satirist to be consumed. The many compliments paid me in other parts of your works amply compensate for this slight in­dignity; and be assured, that no little pique or misunderstanding shall ever make me a foe to genius."’ Pope bowed in some confusion, and promised to substitute a fictitious name at least, which was all that was left in his power. He then retired, after having made a sacrifice of a little paquet of Antitheses, and some parts of his translation of Homer.

During the course of these oblations, I was charmed with the candour, decency, and judgment, with which all the priests discharged their different functions. They behaved with such dignity that it [Page 9] reminded me of those ages, when the offices of king and priest centered in the same person. Whenever any of the assistants were at a loss in any particular circumstances, they applied to Aristotle, who settled the whole business in an in­stant.

But the reflections, which this pleasing scene produced, were soon interrupted by a tumultuous noise at the gate of the temple; when suddenly a rude illiterate multitude rushed in, led by Tindal, Morgan, Chubb and Bolingbroke. The chiefs, whose countenances were impressed with rage whch art could not conceal, forced their way to the altar, and amidst the joyful acclamations of their followers threw a large volume into the fire. But the triumph was short, and joy and acclamation gave way to silence and astonishment. The Vo­lume lay unhurt in the midst of the fire, and, as the flames played innocently about it, I could dis­cover, written in letters of gold, the words THE BIBLE. At that instant my ears were ravished with the sound of more than mortal musick, accompany­ing a hymn, sung by invisible beings, of which I well remember the following verses:

The united melody of instruments and voices, which formed a concert so exquisite, that as Milton says ‘"it might create a soul under the ribs of death,"’ threw me into such extasies, that I was awakened by their violence.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER I.

A GENIUS is a character purely modern, and of so late an origin, that it has never yet been described or defined in any treatise, es­say, lexicon, or dictionary. It is now, however, become almost universal. The originals are, in­deed, so numerous, and the features so strong, that it requires but little skill to take an exact like­ness. I am myself an acknowledged GENIUS; and since it is no more than drawing my own picture, I cannot better introduce myself to the reader, than by giving at one stroke a rough draught of my own character, and that of the nu­merous fraternity, by way of preliminary paper, or frontispiece, if you please, to the ensuing spe­culations.

[Page 12]The ancients, according to their wonted nar­rowness of soul, honoured a very small portion of the human race with this appellation. He, who to extraordinary talents had added extraordinary application, after the most arduous efforts to­wards excellence in some one art or science, was perhaps at last fortunate enough to extort this dis­tinction. The more generous moderns demand only the first requisites; and even those, like the places of men ballotted into the militia, may be supplied by substitutes. Vanity or assurance may pass, in the modern muster, for superior faculties. The GENIUS, endowed with them, needs neither diligence nor assiduity. Supported by confidence, he disdains to halt along on the crutches of application. So far from being versed merely in one science, he runs round the whole circle at his pleasure. Knowledge is rained down on his head like manna from heaven, and he has no care but to gather it as it falls. Almost every man is an adept in every art; acquires learning without study; improves his good sense without meditation; writes without reading; and, being full as well acquainted with one thing as another, is an un­questionable GENIUS; or, what is more extraordi­nary, maintains his right to that title without know­ing, or even pretending to know, any thing at all.

[Page 13]There is a certain reverend and affecting biogra­pher in this town, who pens, almost every six weeks, the memoirs of several unfortunate great men, and among them of many a GENIUS. In order to shew the characters of his heroes at full length, he takes up their adventures, e'en from their boyish days, and fairly sets down a plain account of their life, character, and behaviour, beginning with their birth, parentage, and education; so that the reader may see at one glance, by what steps they have gained the top-most round of the ladder. In imitation of so great an example, I will endeavour to trace the GENIUS almost from his birth to his sublimest stage of excellence. GENIUS is, indeed, universally allowed to be the gift of nature: we cannot therefore be surprised to find it, like Hercules, exerting its strength in the cradle.

The cradle, indeed, may be considered as a mere hot-bed for the raising of GENIUS; which is a plant of so delicate a nature, that it is often nipt in the bud. There never was a child, as its pa­rents will tell you, who did not soon give evident tokens of the brightest parts, by doing and saying ten thousand witty things, which were never done or said before since the infancy of Cain and Abel. [Page 14] The wit of a child, like that of a monkey, (which is a very wise animal, and, we are told, could speak if it would) consists in mischief; and the more spirit little master possesses, the more enter­taining he is to the company. I remember, that I was once taken so much notice of for my wit and humour in pulling off a grave gentleman's wig, that it afterwards betrayed me into several scrapes, by playing the same tricks over again upon dull fellows, who had not such strong ideas of pleasantry. It may not be amiss to observe here, that practical strokes of humour are those, in which a GENIUS takes the most delight.

At school the young GENIUS will begin to heighten our expectations of his future abilities. His parts, indeed, will be too brilliant to attend the instruc­tions he might receive there; but his spirit will have more room to display itself. He may be at the bottom of his class, but he will be at the head of every scrape. He may be deficient in Greek and Latin, make false concord in his prose, and be guilty of false quantities in his verse; yet, before he leaves school, he will not be unacquainted with the world, will walk familiarly into a tavern, know the best songs at Comus's court, and the names and persons of the kindest ladies upon town. But, [Page 15] when once relieved from scholastick restraints, as his sphere will be more noble, his fame will be­come more eminent. If he is entered at either of our universities, the tameness of an academical life being ill adapted to the vivacity of his dispo­sition, he will spend all his time in Covent Garden by way of being in genteel company. If he is sent abroad, because, forsooth, his wise parents or guardians imagine that the discipline of our own universities is not strict enough, he will soon convince them that the government of foreign academies is infinitely more lax. He will speedily distinguish himself by his uncommon spirit; and after shooting a waiter, killing his friend in a duel, or perhaps contaminating the sixty descents in the house of a German baron by decoying his daughter, he may ride post out of the continent, and be glad to embark in a storm in order to get safe footing in Old England.

Old England is, indeed, the noblest theatre in the universe for a GENIUS. Here he may go through all the changes and diversities of his character at plea­sure. Here he may send his mistress to parade through the streets in a gilt chariot, drawn by pye­bald horses; he may at the same time be so deeply engaged at play, that his own chariot may [Page 16] stand at the door of Arthur's till eight in the morn­ing. He may ride his own matches at Newmarket, and perform new miracles against time and weight, and number of horses, every season. In a word, he may indulge his vivacity in every ebullition of GE­NIUS, from tossing off his quarts of champagne, to shooting himself through the head.

With this spirit and vivacity may a GENIUS of quality and estate employ himself: but as talents are the gift of nature, and riches the mere favours of fortune, it happens unluckily, that many a GENIUS is reduced to the mean resources of trade or profession to support himself. In these cases, if the warmth of a GENIUS is not abated, it involves him in many difficulties. The spirit of the clerk in a compting-house may perhaps betray him into a for­gery; and the evil GENIUS of the apprentice may tempt him to commit depredations on the till.

The young physician of GENIUS, instead of throwing that solemnity into his countenance, which would make him look as if he had himself taken the potion he should prescribe, adopts a whimsical air, and soon loses his credit with the old practitioners, the apothecaries, and his bro­ther-attendants at the hospital, by laughing at the farce of physick, and swearing that water-gruel is [Page 17] of infinitely more service than the whole Materia Medica. A GENIUS of this species sometimes re­trieves himself by recurring irregularly to physick, and hawking a nostrum.

The lively student at the inns of court has too sublime a turn of mind to follow his profession. He gives the attornies a contempt for him by en­deavouring to converse with them facetiously; and is seen walking the streets in an illegal bag-wig, instead of prudently wearing the business-following bob. He may be found oftener behind the scenes at the play-house, than in the courts of justice; and if he is a prodigious GENIUS indeed, he even writes for the stage.

The exploits of a modern GENIUS in high life are indeed no where to be equalled, except by the pro­ductions of a modern GENIUS in low life, as an author. His works are not to be estimated accord­ing to the quality, but the quantity of them; and they are sold, wholesale and retail, to one set of booksellers, as another set of booksellers in Moorfields sell those of his predecessors—by the pound. He is not only capable of writing in any science, but he will undertake to write in all sciences at once. He will publish in one day detached parcels of biography, architecture, [Page 18] husbandry, gardening, and cookery. He will be, at one and the same time, the author of a long history, the translator of a voluminous foreign writer, the inventor of a novel, the conductor of a review, the Doer of a magazine, and the manager of a news-paper. In comparison to him, Tully shall appear to have written a volume no bigger than the primer, and the Iliad shall shrink into a nutshell. Longinus, from his great learn­ing, was denominated a walking musaeum; and our GENIUS, from the number and quality of his pro­ductions, may be more familiarly stiled a cir­culating library.

Such an author am I, the GENIUS. History shall stand still for events, and I will transcribe the news-papers, as the annals of politicks and lite­rature, 'ere my pen shall cease to go on. Loose papers, such as these, will scarce engage the atten­tion of a moment, and will be hastily scribbled over at the tea-table, just when the whim shall sieze me, or any amusing thoughts come uppermost in the whirl of my imagination. The reader there­fore must not expect me at certain periods, since I shall always pop abruptly in upon him. Some­times he may see me once, sometimes twice, in a week; and sometimes perhaps not above once in a [Page 19] fortnight. I hope to wait on him again very soon; and, as I have here said something of my disposition and situation, I propose in my next to give an exact description of my person.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER II.

NOTWITHSTANDING the eminent advan­tages resulting from the many rare talents and qualities necessarily included in that illustrious character described in my first paper, under the title of a GENIUS, I am, I must confess, neither the most completely happy, nor most universally ac­complished man in the creation. Nature, who has in some instances been lavish in her bounties to me, has in others been rather too unkind, and indeed remarkably niggard of her favours. Vanity, for example, she has so exuberantly poured upon me, that my portion, to say no more of it, is at least sufficient to embolden me to venture forth as an author; and yet my sensibility is, at the same time, unfortunately so nice and exquisite, that it [Page 20] becomes a perpetual thorn in the sides of that very vanity, laying it open to every slight attack, and rendering it too easily wounded by the petulance of folly, the slanders of envy, the gross jests of buf­foonery, or the malice of a review.

But the greatest drawback, which nature has, in my case, made on that vanity and self-applause, which contributes more or less to the happiness of every man and woman in the world, is most unfor­tunately external; visible to all eyes, open to ge­neral observation, and liable to ridicule from the dullest fellow, that casts a look upon my person. Peculiarities of figure, whether in make, size, or complection, have always been deemed an inex­haustible source of ridicule to the associates of the man who possesses them. He, whose person is re­markable, seems to be considered as a butt, planted by nature, for all other men to shoot their wit at. The coarse humour of our own vulgar, however blind to mental blemishes, is sharp-sighted as a lynx to external defects, and exerts itself as li­berally on genteeler passers-by, as on their own hump-backed companion, whom they jocularly en­title, my lord. Homer represents the gods themselves as laughing at the ugly, aukward, blacksmith divi­nity of Vulcan. Tully in his Dialogues de Oratore, [Page 21] recommends it to an orator to be pleasant and face­tious on personal defects; though perhaps rather unadvisedly, and unsuitably to the grave dignity of that profession: and, now we are got so deep in learned quotations, I defy the scholar to find in Lucian, Aristophanes, Theophrastus, or any other author, ancient or modern, a greater profusion of wit and humour bestowed on any one subject, than Shakespeare has lavished, in his several descripti­ons of Falstaff, Shallow, and Bardolph, on a fat man, a lean man, and a man with a red nose. Happy indeed would it be for any other man, (es­pecially if he be a wit and a Genius) who bears about in his person this native fund of pleasantry: if he could say with Falstaff, and with equal justice too, ‘"I am not only witty myself, but also the cause of wit in other men."’

Let not, however, the partial reader con­clude too hastily from what has been said, that I pretend to the honour of the deformity of Scarron, the crookedness of Pope, the blindness of Milton or Homer, or even the long nose, or no nose of Tristram Shandy. Not to make any further de­lay of introduction, after having so long announced myself to the good company, the truth, and the whole truth, is, that I am of a remarkable low [Page 22] stature; a sort of diminutive plaything of Madam Nature, that seems to have been made, like a girl's doll, to divert the good lady in her infancy; a little [...] without a tittle o'top; an human figure in miniature; a make-weight in the scale of morta­lity; a minim of nature; a mannikin, not to say minnikin; and indeed rather an abstract or brief chronicle of man's fair proportions, than a man at large. My person, indeed, is not formed in that excellent mould of littleness, which, as in some insects and animals, becomes beautiful from the nice texture and curious composition of its parts. I may be seen, it is true, without the help of a microscope; and am not even qualified to ri­val the dwarf Coan, by being exhibited to my wor­thy countrymen at six-pence a-piece. I am, however, so low in stature, that my name is hardly ever mentioned without the epithet little being prefixed to it: the moment that my person presents itself among strange company, the first idea that strikes the beholders is the minuteness of the figure, and a whisper instantly buzzes round the room, lord! what a little creature! As I walk along the street, I hear the men and women say to one another, there goes a little man!—In a word, it is my irreparable misfortune to be, with­out [Page 23] out my shoes, little more than five feet in height. Eating of daisy-roots, we are told, will retard a man's growth: if the French alimentary powder, or any other new-invented diet, would at once elevate me, and surprise my friends, I would go through a long regimen to be raised ever so little nearer heaven. I think I could not endure to have my limbs stretched to a nobler length in the bed of Procrustes; but, if I could be rolled out like dough or paste, or extended by relaxation, like a rope or an eel's skin in dry weather, I believe I should readily assent to it: for there is no impos­sibility existing in nature, or recorded in scripture, at the truth of which I am more apt to repine, than that no man is able to add a cubit to his stature.

When the camel applied to heaven for some amendment in his figure, Jupiter (says the fabulist) cropt his ears for his impertinence. I should be very loth, like some of my cotemporaries of the quill, by any means to endanger my ears; and yet nothing but the back of the camel being placed on my little body, could make me wish more ardently, than I do at present, for an happy al­teration in it. For not to mention the natural in­conveniencies of being trampled on and run over in a croud, almost prest to death by huge [Page 24] fellows and fat old women in machines and stage­coaches, deprived of all pleasure at sights and shews by taller persons taking their places before me;—not to dwell, I say, on these and several other circumstances of the same nature, it provokes me to find, that though I can sometimes as ab­solutely forget my littleness, as if I was as big as Goliah, yet my friends and acquaintance cannot, for one moment, lose the consideration of it. The minuteness of my person so entirely governs their idea of my character, that they are not able to detach the contemplation of one from the other; and from the mere credit of having a larger quantity of clay and dirt put together in their huge frames than myself, they become (as Beatrice terms it) such valiant pieces of dust, that a man who has room enough in his bosom for more gall than a pigeon, must be moved with indig­nation. If they think of my marriage, they set themselves to consider, what fairy they shall find for me, or whether it would not be better to cross the breed by providing me an amazon: they would have my chariot, like queen Mab's, made out of an hazel-nut: and as to an house, the case of a tre­ble hautboy were a mansion for me.

[Page 25]A very intimate friend of mine one day inad­vertently betrayed to me, that his wife always spoke of me by the name of the baby; but after­wards, in order to mend the matter, he added, that she had no contemptible opinion of my per­son, for that she always said, ‘"she never saw such a little man that was so strait."’ In families, where I visit, growing lads of thirteen or fourteen years of age are called out to stand back to back with me, and measure whether there is any differ­ence between their height and mine: and once, I remember, on my visit to an acquaintance newly-married, being introduced to the bride, who was a fine tall woman, (but a prude or a wit, I cannot tell which) she held her head so high, without making the least inclination of her body, that I could as easily have scaled the monument, as have come at the tip of her chin without the help of a pair of steps. One day, just after the passing of the broad-wheel act, being on the road on a little poney, the man of the turnpike seeing me and my nag approach, cried out, ‘"Nay, nay, this must be above weight, I am sure."’ and, closing the gate, left me to go over the place appointed for weighing the waggons. Another time, after hav­ing dined at a nobleman's house, I was honoured [Page 26] with the use of his lordship's chariot to carry me home, but was desired first to set down another of the company at St. James's coffee-house. My fel­low traveller, if I may so call him, was one of the biggest and tallest men in the kingdom, and was at least four and twenty stone in weight. Thus ridiculously coupled, like a lean rabbit and a fat one, we engaged the attention of the whole street, particularly of the company at Arthur's, who stood laughing, as we passed by, to see the body of the chariot inclined all one way, as if we were driving on the slope of a hill, though the wheels ran on as smoothly and evenly as Madam Catha­rina's clockwork equipage on a parlour floor. But I must declare, that the most ridiculous distress I ever underwent, was, when my unfortunate cu­riosity carried me to see that wonderful phaenome­non of nature, the Italian Giant, scarce less than eight feet high! While the rest of the company were walking under his arm, he seemed to ex­pect that I should have crept between his legs; and, when I offered to present him with the usual gratuity, he absolutely refused to accept it, saying, ‘"that he thought it full as great a curiosity to see me, as I could possibly think it to see him."—’In short, my situation is almost as ridiculous as [Page 27] that of Gulliver in Brobdignag; and though I cannot, like him, be carried to the ridge of a house­top by a monkey, or be stuck upright by an un­lucky lad in a marrowbone, yet every day brings with it fresh instances of mortification.

But there is no circumstance moves my spleen more forcibly than the insolence of those, whose stature very little exceeds my own, and who seem to look down on such urchins as myself with a con­sciousness of their happy superiority. One of these always affects to call me the little man; and another small gentleman (a great actor I mean, whom in some future histrio-mastix, some nescio quid majus ROSCIADE, I may possibly take a peg or two lower) is fond of sidling up to me in all publick places, as second-rate beauties commonly contrive to take a dowdy abroad with them for a foil. For my own part, though I could wish to be taller, I never made use of any undue arts to appear so. I am content to submit my littleness, fairly to the world. I never suffered my hat to rise into the air with a staring Kevenhuller, and I would as soon ap­pear in stilts, as be lifted from the ground by dou­ble soles or high heels to my shoes. I rather endeavour to console myself by looking abroad into the world for great men of another order than [Page 28] those described by serjeant Kite: and so success­ful have been my researches of this kind, that I could set down a long catalogue of persons eminent in the state, in the professions, in arts and sciences, (not to mention authors and actors) who are scarce taller than myself; so that in this respect, we may fairly pronounce in favour of the present period, as Lord Clarendon has declared of his own, that ‘"it was an age in which there were many GREAT and WONDERFUL MEN of THAT SIZE."’ I do not know whether in this extremity of war, any new raised regiment offers bounty-money for volunteers five feet high; but we flatter ourselves that, in case an invasion should take place, we could form a corps infinitely more formidable than the late king of Prussia's useless tall regiment.

I cannot close this paper without returning my thanks to the learned university of Oxford, and to the illustrious Queensbury family, for having published the above-mentioned papers of Lord Cla­rendon, in which there is much matter of conso­lation to gentlemen of the like height and dimen­sions with myself. It there appears, that most of his lordship's intimate friends were great and won­derful men of low stature. Mr. Hales, he tells us, was one of the least men in the kingdom, and one [Page 29] of the greatest scholars in Europe. Mr. Chilling­worth was of a stature little superior to Mr. Hales. Of his friend Sidney Godolphin he says, that there never was so great a mind and spirit contained in so little room; so large an understanding, and so unrestrained a fancy, in so very small a body. Of Sir Lucius Carey, afterwards lord Falkland, who was but little taller than Sidney Godolphin, he speaks so highly, that I cannot resist the tempta­tion of gratifying myself and all other little men by transcribing the description of his person, hoping it may serve to recommend us to the favour of the world, and particularly to the good graces of the ladies, who are desired to take notice, that Sir Lucius married for love, and made a most ex­cellent husband. Lord Clarendon speaks thus of him— ‘"with these advantages he had one great disadvantage (which in the first entrance into the world is attended with too much prejudice) in his person and presence, which was in no degree attractive or promising. His stature was low, and smaller than most men; his motion not graceful; and his aspect so far from inviting, that it bad somewhat in it of simplicity: and his voice the worst of the three, and so untuned, that instead of reconciling, it offended the ears, so that no body [Page 30] would have expected musick from that tongue. And sure no man was less beholden to nature for it's recommendation into the world: but then no man sooner, or more, disappointed this general and customary prejudice. That little person and small stature was quickly found to contain a great heart, a courage so keen, and a nature so fearless, that no composition of the strongest limbs, and most harmonious and proportioned presence and strength, ever more disposed any man to the greatest en­terprise; it being his greatest weakness to be too solicitous for such adventures: and that untuned tongue and voice, easily discovered itself to be sup­plied, and governed, by a mind and understand­ing so excellent, that the wit and weight of all he said, carried another kind of lustre, and admiration in it, and even another kind of acceptation from the persons present, than any ornament of delivery could reasonably promise itself, or is usually at­tended with; and his disposition and nature was so gentle and obliging, so much delighted in courtesy, kindness, and generosity, that all man­kind could not but admire and love him."’

After this extract from Lord Chancellor Claren­don, I beg leave to address myself to all little men, who are desirous to become great and wonderful, [Page 31] like Sir Lucius, intreating them to meditate atten­tively for that end on the following maxim of that other great chancellor, Lord Bacon; which maxim may also serve as a sort of moral to this long paper on a short man: whosoever hath any thing fixt in his person that doth induce contempt, hath also a perpetual spur in himself to rescue and deliver himself from scorn.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER III.

AFTER having kept the discourse entirely to myself, and made myself the delightful sub­ject of that discourse for two whole papers, I am glad of an opportunity to relieve my readers by publishing the two following letters.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER IV.

‘"WAR, saith Vincent Wing in his almanack, begets poverty, poverty peace."’ Now as some, at least, of the parties engaged in the present contest, seem to be nearly whirled round to that part of the circle of events, described by the learned Philomath in the lines above-mentioned, all considerate persons begin to look forward to the consequences of such a revolution. The sagacious gentlemen at the Smyrna have already deliberated what part of our conquests we shall sorego, and what we shall retain. It was but the other day, that I saw a political junto in a corner of the room, with a map of America lying before them, and heard their final resolution not to restore an acre of Canada; though they were a little [Page 44] disconcerted by a sugar-merchant from the city, who happened to drop in at the time, and declared with an oath, that the nation was undone, if we agreed to give up Guadalupe. The dealers in the stocks at Garraway's and Jonathan's are locking up all their ready money in the funds, and calculating at how much per cent. advance they shall be able to sell out on the proclamation of peace; and, in the mean time, some of the gentlemen at Arthur's, with many other persons at both ends of the town, are attentively considering the consequences of a peace in diminishing or increasing the emoluments of their several places, employments, or professions. A friend of mine, a very honest gentleman, who is an agent in the city, told me last week, that, if he was but so happy as to see the war continue for only four years more, he should make an estate, and ride in his coach and six: and it was but the next day that another intimate acquaintance, who has an employment in the war-office, declared to me, that he should lay down his chariot immediately upon a peace. For my own part, none of the va­rious considerations, just enumerated, take hold on me. I have, I am sorry to say it, no money in the funds, and no employment under the government; and, as to politicks, since these are not times [Page 45] when author-incendiaries are hired to take up the bellows to kindle the embers of sedition, or paid for laying them down again, what has a GENIUS to do with such considerations on the war or the peace? Libels, publick or private, are, alas! attended only with fines, imprisonment, and the pillory. Waving, therefore, all other reflections, I shall consider this important event, come when it may, as a mere moralist; and endeavour to trace out the most probable effects of a peace, on the manners and principles of the good people of Great Britain.

I think, I may venture to prognosticate, that its first visible effects will be manifest in our dress, so that every lady and gentleman may be said to carry about them a kind of badge of peace and reconci­liation, by adopting that foreign air, of which we are so great admirers. I have no apprehension that our home manufactures will stand still, and that the industrious artists of Spital-fields, whom publick spirit has of late so much encouraged, will be left to starve for want of due employment; but I think I foresee a whole pacquet of tailors, hair-cutters, and milliners, coming over in every vessel, and new patterns for caps and handkerchiefs, with the true Paris cut for cloaths, sent by every mail. There [Page 46] seems to have been much decency and chaste reserve in the habit of both sexes during the war; but, as we are allowed to be a very imitative, though not an inventive nation, I have some dread of the new fashions to be introduced after the peace. Then, perhaps, we may again see, among the ladies, uncovered shoulders, naked breasts, and legs revealed above the ancle; and among the men, short jerkins, white hats, and red-heeled shoes. In order to prevent these and other irregularities, I would humbly propose that, before the treaty is concluded, a congress of dressers, friseurs, and tyrewomen, plenipotentiary, be appointed to meet in some neutral country; and that, in the mean time, wooden dolls, dressed, a la mode de Païs, be reciprocally sent over between the cities of London and Paris, the better to adjust the preliminaries.

The large cargoes of tailors, &c. which the peace will waft over, will, however, be very ina­dequate to the number of English gentlemen, and Milors Angloises, that will immediately set sail for France, not for the sake of interest, but dissipa­tion. A bridge from Dover to Calais would per­haps hardly render the emigrations of our people more frequent. Paris will then be considered as an addition to the number of our places of publick [Page 47] resort, and visited with as much readiness as Tun­bridge, Bath, or Scarborough. This is a field which affords so much room for observation, that perhaps I may think it worth while to collect my materials on the spot, and may date some of my future papers from a Hotel at Paris. In the mean time, as our ministry and parliament will un­doubtedly turn their thoughts towards the reduc­tion of the national debt, necessarily increased by an expensive, though glorious war, my skill in politicks cannot suggest a better measure or more equitable tax to their consideration, than an heavy duty on the exportation of fools.

The ladies, who have justly complained of the dearth of men during the war, will, I dare say, concur with me in the propriety of this new tax, and to oblige them I would propose that all importations of volunteers from abroad, and other recruits, may be permitted duty-free. At the same time I cannot but congratulate my fair countrywomen on the great plenty of males, which the peace must produce. We shall no longer see a row of disconso­late females, sitting, like superannuated maidens, unsollicited at a ball, or a lady of fashion reduced to the necessity of figuring in with the butler. The officers of disbanded regiments will be glad to [Page 48] supply the deficiencies of half pay by the accession of a large portion with a wife; and the brave gentlemen of the militia, no longer embodied or traversing the country to distant encampments, will add to the publick meetings and assemblies of their own counties the brilliancy of a red coat and cockade, without the terror that such a dress com­monly brings with it, and as much harmlessness as a sword in the scabbard. These new-commis­sioned soldiers may rejoice at the thought of having wiped off the contempt, that once cleaved to the name of MILITIA, and the ladies may be happy to take an hero to their arms, who can fight for his country, without being sent out of it. In a word, this is one of the most jocund ideas, that peace affords. Bath, Bristol, Margate, Brighthelmstone, &c. will again become the scenes of pleasure and delight; and the gallant warriors, who have de­served so well of Mars, now devoted to Venus in her turn, have nothing to do but to recommend themselves to the favour of the fair sex, and en­deavour to repair the ravages of war by determining, with captain Plume, ‘" To raise recruits the matrimo­nial way."’

But the joy, which the gaiety of these contem­plations inspires, is much allayed by considering [Page 49] the unhappy situation of the daily, weekly, morning, and evening retailers of news. During the time of war, a battle in Germany, a fort stormed in the West-Indies, or a Nabob created in the East, is worth forty shillings to every paper, that reprints the particulars from the Gazette Extraordinary: nay a town taken or a town lost is equally to the advantage of these half-sheet historians; and the perpetual curiosity kept alive by the publick anxiety, sells off whole quires of uninteresting details of births, deaths, marriages, and bankruptcies. How great then must be the dread of the conse­quences of peace to the proprietors of the swarm of Advertisers, Gazetteers, Ledgers, Journals, Chro­nicles, and Evening Posts? A peace, which will lie heavier on their papers than the double duty on the stamps! My good friend Mr. H. BALDWIN of White Friars has already exprest to me his fears on this occasion. He fairly tells me to my face, that though the GENIUS were to stand in the front of his paper three times a week, the pub­lick attention would flag without great incidents and alarming paragraphs. He further acquaints me that, in order to recommend the St. James's Chronicle, he has engaged an ingenious gentleman, who, besides translating the mails, touching up [Page 50] collectors' paragraphs, and writing occasional let­ters from the Hague, has also a sufficient portion of invention and philosophy, (having finished his education at St. John's college, Cambridge) to draw up accounts of earthquakes, meteors, and eruptions of Aetna and Vesuvius. Notwithstand­ing all this, he requires my further assistance. These, I protest, are matters with which I am very little acquainted; yet, I will strive (to use the news-paper phrase) to establish correspondences of another sort. I will use my interest to oblige the publick, like Boccalini, with the freshest advices from Parnassus; or, if my intelligence from that quarter should fail, I hope at least to be able, as well as some of my cotemporaries, to produce a dialogue from among the dead.

The happiest circumstance which I can recollect in favour of these persons employed in the eternal continuation of modern history, is, that a peace gives consequence and dignity to several events, which would be sunk and neglected during the tu­mult of a war. We all remember to have seen the whole nation, at such a period, split into parties concerning the possibility of a servant girl's subsist­ing for a month on a few crusts of bread and a [Page 51] pitcher of water, while the wits of the age drew their pens, and were ready to spill their last drop of ink on each side of the question. At such a period a rabbit-woman, or a fortune-teller, a quack, or a bottle conjurer, engages the attention and engrosses the conversation of the whole town: and a quarrel between a dancer and his mistress, or a dispute between a couple of opera-singers, is of as much importance as the dissention between two generals. The violence of the British spirit of party will always create fuel for its own flame to feed upon: when it can no longer rage abroad, it will commit devastations at home; when it has no occasion to exert itself in vindication of liberty and property, it will vent itself on trifles; and the politicians of Britain, like the patriots of Lilliput, will divide concerning the height of shoe-heels, or the manner of breaking of eggs.

Among these domestick considerations, there is one in particular, which presses on my mind; but though I feel its force, I am quite at a loss to ex­press my sensations: the idea is indeed too big and lofty, and so far above the pitch of these mean essays, that I seem, like the poet of old, to receive an admonition from some superior, to have re­course to more familiar subjects. I shall, there­fore, [Page 52] leave to some greater matter the endeavour to give to posterity the portrait of a KING, happy in the love and admiration of his subjects, proud of calling every Briton his fellow-countryman, and employed in cultivating THE ARTS of PEACE.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER V.

AT this season of annual migration, (as a great writer solemnly stiles it) when the noble lord and the knight of the shire go down to their several seats, to support their interest in the county; when the lawyer takes his circuit; when the right reverend diocesan appoints his visitation; and when the humble out-rider, astride his saddle-bags, goes his rounds for fresh orders to dealers and chapmen in the country;—in a word, when business or pleasure carry thousands out of town, it is no wonder that one [Page 53] or the other should have transported the GENIUS almost two hundred miles beyond the limits of the bills of mortality. I could oblige the reader with a curious detail of my journey and adventures: I could tell him, that my publisher furnished me with one horse, and my printer with another, together with his devil in livery, for an attendant: but these and many other curious particulars must be deferred to some future opportunity, that in the mean time I may have leisure to communi­cate some few observations made, en passant, on my fellow-subjects resident in the country.

Notwithstanding the encomiums on a rural life, sown so thick in the writings of poets and philosophers, we do not, in this degenerate age, think ourselves sure to breathe the pure air of in­nocence and ancient simplicity, the minute we have got out of the smoke of London; we do not perceive a gradual declension of vice at every mile-stone, or discover morality upon every hay­cock. The clown who works at plough and cart, nay even the tender of sheep, for whom we have so much respect in pastoral and romance, excite our veneration little more than a linkboy or a hackney-coachman. The very milkmaid, with her pail on her head, engages our esteem no more [Page 54] than her fellow-labourers, who carry the yoke, about our streets: and so little do we expect to find the manners of the golden age prevail among our rusticks, that we see, without remorse or sur­prise, some bumkin Phillis condemned to the gallows for the murder of her bastard child, or a refractory Damon committed to the house of cor­rection, set in the stocks, or sent abroad for a soldier.

But though we have surmounted these preju­dices, perhaps we still retain some antiquated ideas of the manners of the country, scarce less re­mote from those which at present reign there, than even the manners of Arcadia. We are apt to take it for granted, that there yet remains among them, a strong leaven of that roughness and rusticity, which was so long considered as their distinguishing characteristick. It is scarce half a century ago, since the inhabitants of the distant counties were regarded as a species, almost as dif­ferent from those of the metropolis, as the na­tives of the Cape of Good Hope. Their man­ners, as well as dialect, were entirely provincial; and their dress no more resembling the habit of the town, than the Turkish or Chinese. But time, which has inclosed commons, and ploughed up heaths, has likewise cultivated the minds, and [Page 55] improved the behaviour of the ladies and gentlemen of the country. We are no longer encountered with hearty slaps on the back, or prest to make a breakfast on cold meat and strong beer; and in the course of a tour of Great Britain, you will not meet with a high-crowned hat, or a pair of red stockings. Politeness and taste seem to have driven away the horrid spectres of rudeness and barbarity, that haunted the old mansion-house and its purlieus, and to have established their seats in the country.

It is certainly to the intercourse between the town and country, of late so much more frequent, that this extraordinary change must be imputed. Every traveller, that goes down to Cumberland or Cornwall, carries in some sort the town along with him, and inevitably leaves some tincture of it behind him: and every visit, which an honest rustick pays to London, insensibly files off some of the rust of the country. Formerly indeed, when that the roads were dark, and ways were mire, as Milton expresses it in one of his sonnets, a journey into the country was considered as almost as great an undertaking as a voyage to the In­dies. The old family coach was sure to be stowed, according to Vanburgh's admirable description of [Page 56] it, with all sorts of luggage and provisions; and perhaps in the course of the journey, a whole vil­lage, together with their teams, were called in aid to dig the heavy vehicle out of the clay, and to drag it to the next place of wretched accom­modation, which the road afforded. Thus they travelled, like the caravan over the deserts of Ara­bia, with every disagreeable circumstance of te­diousness and inconvenience. But now, the amendment of the roads, with the many other im­provements of travelling, have in a manner opened a new communication between the several parts of our island. The people venture forth, and find themselves enabled to traverse the country with ease and expedition. Stage-coaches, machines, flys, and post-chaises are ready to transport passen­gers to and fro between the metropolis and the most distant parts of the kingdom. The lover now can almost literally annihilate time and space, and be with his mistress, before she dreams of his arrival. Even a troop of geese and turkies may be driven from the country to town in a shorter time, than a nobleman and his family could have taken the journey heretofore, and the game­ster offers to bet, that he can go from London to Edinburgh in twelve hours. In short, the manners, [Page 57] fashions, amusements, vices, and follies of the me­tropolis, now make their way to the remotest corners of the land, as readily and speedily along the turn­pike road, as, of old, Milton's SIN and DEATH, by means of their marvellous bridge over the Chaos, from the infernal regions to our world.

The effects of this easy communication, have almost daily grown more and more visible. The several great cities, and we might add many poor country towns, seem to be universally inspired with an ambition of becoming the little Londons of the part of the kingdom wherein they are situated: the notions of splendor, luxury, and amusement, that prevail in town, are eagerly adopted; the various changes of the fashion ex­actly copied; and the whole manner of life studi­ously imitated. The country ladies are as much devoted to the card-table, as the rest of the sex in London; and being equally tired of making puddings and tarts, or working screens and car­pets, they too have their routes, and croud as many of their neighbours as they can get together, into their apartments: they too, have their balls and concerts by subscription; their theatres, their mall, and sometimes their rural Ranelagh, or Vauxhall. The reading female hires her novels [Page 58] from some country circulating library, which consists of about an hundred volumes, or, is trundled from the next market town in a wheelbarrow; and the merchant, or opulent hardware-man, has his villa three or four miles distant from the great town where he carries on his business. The nobleman and country squire, no longer affect an old-fashioned hospitality, or suffer the locusts of the country to eat them up, while they keep open house, and dispense victuals and horns of beer, like the anci­ent convents, to all comers; but more fashion­ably display the elegance of their taste, by making genteel entertainments: the same French cooks are employed, the same wines are drank, the same gaming practised, the same hours kept, and the same course of life pursued in the country as in town. The force of this illustrious example in­fluences the whole country; and every male and female wishes to think and speak, to eat and drink, and dress, and live, after the manner of people of quality in London.

There is no popular subject of satire, on which the modern common places of wit and ridicule have been exhausted with more success, than on that of a mere cockney affecting the pleasures of the country. The dusty house close to the road side, [Page 59] the half-acre of garden, the canal no bigger than a wash-hand bason, &c. have all been marked out with much humour and justice; but after all, it is not unnatural for a tradesman, who is continu­ally pent up in the close streets and alleys of a po­pulous city, to wish for fresh air, or to attempt to indulge a leisure hour in some rural occupation; and he who prevails on himself to give up the en­joyments which nature has thrown into our laps in the country, for a poor imitation of the follies of the town, is infinitely more ridiculous. Ly­curgus passed a law in Sparta to prevent the impor­tation of foreign vanities, and not only expressly forbad the continuance of strangers in the city, for fear of their corrupting the people, but for the same reasons would not permit his own people to travel. Frequent intercourse will undoubtedly pro­duce similarity of manners; but the present com­munication between the various quarters of our islands, are so far from being to be lamented, that it is only to be wished and recommended, that they may produce real refinements and improvements of a valuable nature. At the same time let it be considered by our country gentlemen and la­dies that no benefit can arise from changing one set of follies for another; and that the vices of the town never appear so truly ridiculous, or so [Page 60] thoroughly contemptible, as when they are auk­wardly practised in the country.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER VI.

SLANDER is an elegant and refined art, which has been brought to such a wonderful perfec­tion, that it is not only universally practised and thoroughly understood, but is become the soul of polite conversation, and one of the most agree­able amusements of private life. Formerly, an infant lye, fearful of detection, and almost ashamed to shew itself in publick, made its way but slowly in the world; but now, the grossest false­hood comes abroad with the utmost confidence, and peremptorily challenges our notice and atten­tion. Not content with a general assertion of [Page 61] any fact, it delights to be minute and circumstan­tial; enters into particulars, tells you the man­ner how, the time when, the place where, and gives the names of all the parties concerned. Such a report having gone round to every coffee-house, and got into every private family, having been uni­versally told, and almost as universally credited, comes at last to the ears of the persons, who have been the unconscious subjects of it. Then the whole story proves entirely groundless; but they, whose reputation has been thus sported with, have no remedy except the consciousness of their own integrity, unless they chuse to make a genteel retaliation on their next neighbour, or to encoun­ter with the air. It might be deemed too severe an act of censorial authority, to discountenance so polite an entertainment, and might, perhaps, put some of the best company to silence. Yet, since it is but of late that slander has, at its very birth, come forth (like Pallas from the head of Jupiter) armed at all points, hedged round with circumstance, and lackered over with probability, it may not be incurious to enquire, who are these active ministers of falshood, that set it so firmly on its legs, and bring it so early to maturity: I shall therefore dedicate the present paper to the [Page 62] description of two of these ingenious characters, each of which rough draughts, the reader, who is at all conversant with the world, will, I am sure, be able to apply to more than one original.

LADY JACYNTHA SCANDAL is a woman of the first fashion, and her house is the daily resort of the first company. Her reputation, it is true, is not quite unstained; but the blemishes of her character, like the spots in the sun, are overcome by the splendor of her quality. By the force of a genteel malice and pleasant ill-nature, together with an happy assurance that enables her to throw off the reserve of her sex, she is universally ac­knowledged to be a wit. The smartness of her re­partees bespeaks uncommon vivacity, and her ex­quisite turn for the double Entendre denotes an ad­mirable pruriency of imagination. She will tell a story to a room full of mixt company, almost rich enough in its circumstances for the high-wrought memoirs of a woman of pleasure, with­out using one indelicate expression, without offend­ing the chastest ear, or betraying the least con­sciousness that she is all the while on the very brink of indecorum. She receives all her visitors with the most perfect good breeding; but the in­stant that any one of them departs, he becomes [Page 63] the subject of her pleasantry and ridicule to those that stay behind. She cannot raise our idea of her own character, but she can lessen our opinion of another's. In a word, her ladyship is the fear and delight, the envy and scorn, the honey and gall, of the great world: nobody thinks well of her, but nobody speaks ill of her, and every body visits her.

Neither love, nor honours, nor riches, nor any other worldly pleasure, can give half so much de­light to LADY JACYNTHA SCANDAL, as the gratification of her dear passion for mischief: and there are likewise certain other female geniusses, who love a little witty malice better than their prayers. Several of these are frequently assembled at LADY JACYNTHA's, and it is to the ingenuity of this petticoat junto that the strange reports, which alarm the whole town, are often owing. They are not contented with the more than usual poig­nancy of their chit-chat over the tea-table, but set themselves to invent important slanders, and to devise the surest means to give them colour. If some pale-faced London coquette, some hagged member of the cabal, worn to the bone with paint and late hours, is offended with the ruddy bloom of some new toast from the country, it is here [Page 64] that she meditates revenge, and it is suddenly proclaimed, or, as the phrase is, reported, that the innocent young lady has been detected in the grossest familiarities with one of her father's foot­men; or if a dutchess has piqued some of the junto, by excluding them from her route, or leaving them uninvited to a ball, her rank will so little avail to exempt her from the like treatment, that the slander will rather be aggravated in pro­portion to the dignity of its object.

Never did statesman study more attentively the art of political lying, or stockjobber use more stra­tagems to raise or sink the value of the funds, than are used by the ingenious junto, to send forth an injurious report with secrecy. Nobody knows on what authority the story is founded which every body repeats; and it is as impossible to trace the slander up to its source, as to dis­cover the head of the Nile. I have observed, indeed, that it commonly takes its rise in the most dis­tant quarter, from that where the parties reside whom it is intended to affect. When a person of high rank is destined for the victim, an emissary is dispatched to set the story abroach at some ob­scure coffee-house in the city, whence it speedily marches to its head quarters near the court: or, [Page 65] if perhaps some rich banker and his family are to be made a sacrifice, it is whispered about the politer part of the town, that a certain great house near the Royal Exchange has stopt payment. Some­times the curious tale seems to have travelled out of the country, and sometimes, like the great fire of London, it breaks out in several quarters of the town at once. However, come whence it may, true or false, probable or improbable, down it goes; and the dear, witty, sweet, mischievous crea­tures, who invented it, practise ten thousand additional little arts to give it credit. ‘"They do not believe, indeed, that the thing happened, just as it is related; but then there must be some­thing in it, say what they will, or else how could there be such a number of particulars? They have heard too, (good souls!) nay, they know, that the parties themselves are very uneasy at the story, and have taken a great deal of pains to discredit it, which looks very suspicious; for why should they be so concerned, if, ( in part at least) it were not true, or suffer their peace to be broken by a mere idle report?"’ With such candour and humanity do LADY JACYNTHA, and the rest of these good sort of people express their sentiments; and at the same [Page 66] time many of the most intimate friends of the per­sons reviled repeat the slander, or at least make no efforts to contradict it: yet where is the offence or injury? it was not their invention, you know, and they only joined in the common talk of the town.

Lord Bacon somewhere remarks that great inqui­sitiveness and curiosity concerning the affairs of others, is one of the chief characteristicks of envy. It would be unpardonable to attribute so black a passion to a fine lady; and yet it is certain, that no mortal was ever more strongly possessed of that inquiring spirit than LADY JACYNTHA SCANDAL. She will hold long conferences, for the sake of intelligence, with her mantua-maker or milliner, and has an admirable knack at draw­ing the secrets of families from servants and chil­dren. By these, and the like means, she is ac­quainted with the private business and private plea­sures of the whole town. Nobody knows so well as her ladyship, what lady's diamonds are in pawn, what duke's estate was lately mortgaged, what lord's sister's fortunes are not paid off, what poet keeps a mistress, what young man and woman are clandestinely married, or what grave judge has been caught, in a frolicksome vein, at [Page 67] a game of romps with his cook-maid. Such are the anecdotes which she is eager to learn; and her assiduity in collecting them is only to be equalled by her industry in making them publick.

Equally attached to slander, but of the other sex, and of a lower rank, is the pert, volatile, prating, scribbling, JACKY TATTLE. JACKY is the son of an attorney of Furnival's-Inn, and was originally intended for his father's profession; but the strength of his Genius soon drew him from the desk, and carried him amongst under-actors, un­der-authors, and women of the town: in which company he soon converted his pertness into assu­rance, and wonderfully improved his natural ta­lents for lying and defamation. Slander may, indeed, be said to be his passion, and to spread it his daily employment; and as birds are observed to peck the finest fruit, so this fluttering tom-tit always aims his petulant attacks at the fairest cha­racters. The company with which he associates, naturally deal in detraction, his folly induces him to give credit to the slander, and his vanity often urges him publickly to interfere in it. He is also a great writer of anonymous epistles from unknown friends, as well as incendiary letters from secret enemies. He sometimes amuses himself [Page 68] with sending letters and paragraphs to the news­papers, in which he sometimes appears as a six-lined epigrammatist, and is confidently said to be the author of several articles in The New Review. If ever you observe an imper­tinent fellow, in the next box at a coffee­house, listening to your private conversation with a friend, or casting his eye over a letter, which you are reading or writing, that is JACKY TATTLE.—Or if you see a strange town-fly fluttering at the play-house, staring every body out of countenance, and buzzing about the theatre, now in the orchestra, now in the green-boxes, and by-and-by behind the scenes, that is JACKY TATTLE.—Poor JACKY's courage is unhappily not quite adequate to his malignity, so that his indiscretions have sometimes betrayed him into punishment for his slanders; yet his appetite for detraction must be gratified; he considers himself as a formidable adversary to several characters of merit, and is thoroughly persuaded that the ladies all believe him to be a wit and a fine gentleman.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER VII.

NOTWITHSTANDING the rigour of some criticks, which would entirely preclude the choice of temporary subjects, there are no parts of periodical publications, which have been more favourably received at their first appearance, or afforded more entertainment afterwards, than such as were founded on matters merely fugi­tive, and peculiar to the time in which they were written. Such pieces become a kind of supplement to history: they furnish the curious with anec­dotes; and it is from these materials, that the lite­rary virtuoso collects the manners, fashions, and [Page 70] customs of his ancestors. The Tatlers and Spec­tators, for instance, serve almost as effectually as a gallery of pictures, to shew the habits in vogue at that period; and are, at the same time, a kind of historical register of the prevailing plea­sures, and the objects of publick attention. In the perusal of these papers we seem to be endued, like Janus, with a sort of backward face that enables us to take a clear, retrospective view of times past. We spend evenings at the clubs of our fathers, some of whom may perhaps have been Mohocks, and gain admittance to the toilets of our mothers and grandmothers. We read, not without satisfaction, comments on the performances of actors, whom we never saw: we look upon the celebrated trunk-maker with a veneration equal to that of his cotemporaries; and are hugely entertained at Powell's puppet-shew.

It is to be considered, that periodical writers converse more familiarly with the publick than any other authors; they are allowed, nay ex­pected, to chat of themselves, the play, the opera, and are even in danger of being neglected, if they omit to discourse on the popular topicks of conversation. Our good advice (for we are all sagacious monitors of the publick) must not be [Page 71] obtruded on our readers, but must seem to be ushered in by the occasion, and to take its colour from the times. The present complection of the people is such, that I find it absolutely vain and ridi­culous to attempt writing to them on any other subject than that of the Royal Wedding and Coronation. My printer too has most earnestly re­quested me to give what he calls a touch on the times, and to say something on these great occasions. He tells me, that there is scarce one of his cus­tomers, who would not sooner give a guinea for a night's lodging on the floor at Greenwich, or five for the sake of sitting eight and forty hours in Westminster Abby, than part with two-pence half­penny for the GENIUS, unless it treats of those solemnities. Scarce a paragraph of news, relat­ing to any other matters, will go down. The proceedings of the Court of Claims, the ladies coronation robes, and the aldermens' coronation wigs, furnish out the most interesting articles of intelligence. The master of an ale-house in the next lane to my apartments has hung out a pa­per lanthorn to advertise the neighbourhood, that he sells the best Mecklenburg purl and Coronation porter. The theatres are, I doubt not, both employed in the preparation of entertainments [Page 72] suitable to the splendor and joy of these happy cele­brities; and a famous field-preacher has, to my knowledge, already anticipated the Archbishop in a Coronation Sermon.

I have also lately been honoured with a pacquet of letters from several correspondents, not one of which but relates to these two grand occasions of festivity. Many, I find, are sollicitous to know what will become of the GENIUS, and into what corner he will squeeze his little body at the corona­tion. A gentleman, who signs himself Timothy Cautious, tells me, that in case I have no ticket, I may easily be conveyed into the hall undiscovered in some old countess's pocket, or be rolled up and overshadowed by the full bottom of a noble­man's periwig. A lady gives herself the trouble to recapitulate the advantages and disadvantages of my person on this occasion; and informs me that, indeed, I may be put any where, but that unfor­tunately, I shall be able to see no where. Ano­ther correspondent, who subscribes himself COKE junior, and dates from the Inner Temple, says, that he hopes I have secured a place in Westminster­hall, and adds (but I do not know what he means by it) that he should be glad to see me appear there oftener than I used to do. The two following [Page 73] letters are, I think, the most proper of any I have received, to submit to my reader at full length: to them therefore I shall devote the rest of this paper.

The first comes from a lady, and is as follows.

[Page 75]The other letter comes from a gentleman, who, I can assure the publick, is no less a GENIUS than MYSELF.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER VIII.

THE learned and honourable trustees of The Bri­tish Museum, well knowing and duly consider­ing the great work in which I am engaged, and thoroughly weighing the infinite importance of it to the morals of the people of Great Britain, have graciously resolved to afford me every assistance in their power, and given orders to the proper offi­cers for my constant admission to the reading-room, with free leave to peruse such old papers and scarce manuscripts, as my curiosity may lead me to look into. They have also further shewn themselves so favourably inclined to me and my undertakings, that they have set a-part a certain angle of the [Page 79] room for my particular use; wherein there is erected an elegant machine, curiously contrived by Mr. Burnet, cabinet-maker in the Strand, and known by the name of the GENIUS's reading-desk. This machine, in consideration of my diminutiveness, is constructed somewhat on the principles of that used by Gulliver in Brobdignag, and has often enabled me to manage the most unwieldy volumes with ease, as well as, by means of its steps, to climb up to the top of the page of many a tall folio. The modern artificers of furniture have cultivate no taste in moveables with more success, than that which they call the BOOK FASHION; which is an ingenious method of reducing tea-chests to the shape and semblance of octavos and duodecimos, as well as Bedes and other necessary utensils, of a larger size, to the figure of quartos and folios. These goods may be had, neatly gilt and lettered, at the warehouse of any fashionable upholsterer; but where could such a mode be followed with such strict propriety as in the construction of the implements of Literature? On your first entrance into the room, you would take the GENIUS's read­ing desk for an irregular heap of books of different sizes, thrown carelessly one upon another: and, as it is usual to preserve some analogy between the [Page 80] mock volumes and the moveable which takes their form, commonly appropriating Pope's Letters, the Spectators, &c. to the tea-table, and waste paper histories, &c. to the closet; in like manner the artist has ingeniously raised the steps of my desk upon STATIUS, and SCALIGER, and UP- ton, and STEP- ney, and MOUNT- eny, &c. with many other curious conceits of the like nature, not unworthy the genius of an upholsterer. A waggish Cantab, who popt into the room the other day, after having examined the desk with great attention, told me, that he sound the GENIUS, like Bayes, had certain mechanical helps for wit, and christened it (after the university stile of punning) my Gradus ad Parnassum.

A few days ago, as I was studiously employed at this desk, and preparing to say a word or two to the publick, as it were, ex cathedrâ, a sagacious friend of mine, belonging to the Museum, (who is for ever peering with his pur-blind eyes into some curiosity, or brushing with his learned nose the dust from some rare manuscript) threw a bun­dle of papers before me. This choice pacquet appeared, upon examination, to have been formerly in the possession of Sir Thomas More, our great chancellor, of worthy and facetious memory, to [Page 81] whom it was addressed by Petrus Aegidius (or, as some translators call him, Peter Giles) of Antwerp, the very person to whom the chancellor inscribed his History of UTOPIA. This manuscript contains a full detail of the laws, manners, customs, &c. of the inhabitants of the island of ANEMOLIA, taken from memory by Petrus Aegidius, like Sir Thomas More's own narrative, from the relation of Ra­phael. This country, as well as several others mentioned in these papers, is, I find, taken notice of in the Utopia; and Sir Thomas, speaking cur­sorily of the people, calls them superbi magis quam sapientes, a proud rather than a wise nation. My veneration for manuscripts is not so implicit as to think, with some antiquarians, that every old paper is worthy to be printed, which has not yet been in print: but as I look upon this to be of an extremely curious nature, I shall put it to the press with all convenient speed; and my friend above­mentioned has, for the benefit of the illiterate, chearfully submitted to the labour of a translation. This valuable narrative is written originally, like the Utopia, in very elegant Latin; and the genuine papers, for the satisfaction of the Vir­tuosi, shall lie, till the time of publication, at Mr. Becket's, bookseller, in the Strand. In the [Page 82] mean time, I have thought proper to amuse my readers with the following extracts made here and there from different parts of this valuable work, and I believe that most persons will readily concur with me, merely from this specimen, that ANEMO­LIA, must be the most extraordinary country un­der the sun.

P. S. Having proceeded thus far in trans­lating the passages I have selected from the M.S. I find that my extracts are too large to come within the compass of one paper. I am therefore obliged to reserve the rest, among which are many curious particulars relating to the ladies, for my next, with whch I shall present the reader as soon as possible.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER IX.

AS the following letter is the first of any con­sequence, with which I have been favoured from a female hand, the preference due to a lady must be my apology for deferring the rest of the manuscript, relating to the Anemolians, to my next paper.

The GENIUS. NUMBER X.

I Have received the following note in consequence of the extract from the Latin Manuscript, with which I presented my readers a few days ago.

I am sorry to have excited master John Trot's indignation; but if his objections to my pursuing the subject are insuperable, I hereby give him fair warning not to peruse the present paper. I shall only observe, that travellers, writing chiefly for the instruction and entertainment of their own coun­trymen, while they describe the manners of fo­reign nations, and exhibit remote scenes, are apt, like other scene-painters, to work in distemper, and draw things and persons, larger than the life, that they may strike at a distance. This perhaps is in some measure, the case with our present author. The remaining extracts are as follow:

I have presented the reader with the above passage, because I think it extremely curious; but I cannot help fancying, that our author has transgressed the bounds of credibility in this part of his narrative. It is impossible that any females should be guilty of such detestable wick­edness, or give into such gross absurdity. The accurate reader will easily conjecture, from some peculiarities of expression in the above extract, that I have rendered the original with great ex­actness. The translation is indeed very literal, ex­cept that I have here and there taken the liberty to soften some phrases of indignation and reproach which would be esteemed vulgar in our tongue, tho' they have a certain dignity in the learned languages. But to proceed from our M.S.

—I was particularly desirous of laying the above paragraph before the reader, though it contains little else than mere matter of reflection, because I think nothing so much illus­trates a book of voyages, and tends so much to the improvement of the reader, as the sagacious and just observations with which the traveller is com­monly so kind as to oblige him.—But to proceed from our author.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER XI.

SWIFT, by way of describing a reigning controversy of those times, has left us a most droll and humourous account of a battle of the books in St. James's Library; and Boileau in his [Page 109] Lutrin has, with equal pleasantry, brought the two adverse parties in his Poem together in a book­seller's shop, where they break out into open war, and convert the books into weapons of offence. Many harmless volumes are torn from their shelves, and fly through the air as thick as hail; and many a French divine lies sprawling beneath the weight of hard-bound poetry, heavy systems of philosophy, and huge bodies of the law,

Such a description, as that of the French writer, would, I think, be peculiarly applicable to the frequent and violent quarrels among authors. The Republick of letters is in a kind of perpetual civil war, and the beginning of every winter may be considered as the opening of a new literary cam­paign. The short summer truce, hardly kept with good faith, is soon violated; and, while heroes suspend the shedding of blood in war, au­thors contend which shall spill most ink in contro­versy. One discharges the blunderbuss of his wit, and out comes an ode: a second, after whetting the rusty sword of his Genius, cuts you with a sa­tire: a third—but it is endless to go through all the weapons of elegy, song, epigram, &c. and recite the whole artillery of wit—to it they go péle-méle, and, instead of making a general attack on vice [Page 110] and folly, confine themselves to individual knaves and fools, and fall on one another. It is fortunate enough for all new adventurers in these literary en­gagements, that they do not make war exactly after the manner described by Boileau; but that every author throws his work, like a bomb, into the town, leaving it to do what mischief it may, without immediately levelling the volume itself at the head of his antagonist. If that were the case, as at the bookseller's in the Lutrin, we have among us many authors, that would be most for­midable adversaries even to Homer himself; writers, who could overwhelm all the poets and philoso­phers of antiquity with a deluge of literature, and carry all before them in a torrent of folios, quartos, and duodecimos, of their own composition.

One would imagine, that every author is a na­tural enemy to every other author; and that the pursuit of letters, which should refine and huma­nize the mind, serves only to embitter it. No princes can be more jealous of a neighbour's growing power, than some authors of a cotempo­rary's infant fame. In their own reputation too they are tender even to soreness, and do not con­sider, that all, who court applause, may, at the same time, be said to solicit censure. Accordingly, [Page 111] each writer has his flatterers and his enemies; and, if he is vain enough to listen to the adulation of one set of men, and weak enough to feel the malice of the other, he becomes the most unhappy being upon earth. The very nature of his employ­ment betrays him and his quarrels to publick ridicule. Other men differ, and are reconciled in secret; but the contention of authors is studi­ously carried on in the most open manner, and they cut each other to pieces, like prize-fighters, for the diversion of the rest of the world.

The great success of one or two giant satyrists, of transcendant abilities, has tempted almost every puny witling to imagine that same and infamy are at his disposal. He gives you to understand, that, unless you pay due homage to his extraordinary Genius, your name shall be registered in the black scroll of disgrace; and he stands, like a fretful porcupine, ready to dart his quills at all that make him angry. There are, however, a few conside­rations, not unworthy the attention of a writer so subject to irritability. He may, undoubtedly, be of infinite consequence to himseif: every man, especially every author, is so: but it is ten to one if he is of equal consequence to the publick: his works indeed, if they are the result of Genius, may [Page 112] engage their attention; but his private differences will most probably be thought impertinent. I do not know a more ridiculous circumstance than a couple of scribblers, both big with vanity, calling each other fool and blockhead. It is exactly the scene of Vadius and Trissotin in Moliere; which I am surprised that no one, in this age of authors, has translated for the English stage.—Another re­flection,, which might curb their head-strong Pegasus, if he runs riot on the high road of satire, is, that, after all, let him write ever so bitterly, and ever so well, the publick are candid and impartial, and will give him credit no farther than he confirms their own sentiments, and echoes back their own opinion. Pope himself has not been able to rob the eternal butt of his invective, Colley Cibber, of one grain of applause that is due to him; and the united efforts of both him and Swift, powerful as they were, were levelled in vain against Dryden, Vanburgh, Steele, and I will not add Addison. The best answer that an author can make to another who calls him dull (that dreadful sentence!) is to write as well as he can; and if he is not able to confute him that way, he becomes his own satirist. But the chief consideration, which should abate the severity of irritated writers, is, [Page 113] the danger of failing in their attempt. To maim and murder reputations, to hack and hew, and gash at random, is, indeed, what any butcherly scribbler may attempt; but to keep up the fine edge of true satire, requires a very masterly hand: and if his satire proves uncouth, and his execution coarse, it turns back with ten-fold force upon himself, and fastens on him the odious imputation of malice without wit, and envy without abi­lities.

But the worst consequence flowing from this ill blood between the writers of our times, is, that it discourages many men, possest of noble talents, from exerting them in the cause of literature. Fearful of being engaged in this illiberal war­fare, they will not venture to commit their pieces to the press. They would patiently abide the cor­rection of fair critieism, but do not care to provoke unmannerly censures.—In this temper of mind the following lines seem to have been written: at least, it was the perusal of them which threw me into the above vein of reflection. Having read them several times over with pleasure, I was inclined to try their effect upon my readers, especially as I cannot discover in them a line that appears to be personal.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER XII.

OF all the qualifications of the mind, which are not positive virtues, I do not know any that is more desirable than Good Humour. No quality renders the possessor more easy and happy in himself, or recommends him more forcibly to other people. Virtue itself receives additional lustre, abates the rigid severity of its character, and takes its most ravishing graces and embellishments from such a disposition; a disposition so amiable in its nature, [Page 118] that even a man of loose principles, when of so agreeable a turn, often conciliates to himself many friends and well-wishers. The men at least allow that he is a pleasant fellow, court his company, and account him no-body's enemy but his own; while the women call him a dear agreeable creature, and declare that though, to be sure, he is a wild devil, it is quite impossible to be angry with him.

It is hardly saying too much in favour of this quality, to assert that it is one of the first requisites in society: for though strict honour and integrity are of more essential value in the grand purposes of human life; yet Good Humour, like small money, is of more immediate use in the common com­merce of the world. There is no situation in life, no engagement in business, or party of pleasure, wherein it will not contribute to mitigate disap­pointments, or heighten enjoyment. A husband, friend, acquaintance, master, or even servant, however faithful or affectionate, will occasion many miserable hours to himself, as well as to those with whom he is connected, if his virtues are not seasoned with Good Humour; and whether he is a partner for life, or a partner in a country-dance, an associate in great and mighty undertak­ings, or a companion in a post-chaise, he should, [Page 119] on every occasion, cherish and keep alive this agreeable disposition.

Some persons may almost be said to be of a good-humoured complexion, and seem to be constituti­onally endued with this amiable turn of mind: a blessing, for which they may thank heaven with the same kind of gratitude that he ought to feel, who experiences the comforts of being born in a de­lightful and temperate climate. My fellow-coun­try-men, I think, are many of them deficient in that airy pleasantness, and chearful temper, that distinguishes this quality: and as our climate, while it answers all the purposes of use and plenty, yet seldom affords us blue skies, or tempts us to cool grots and purling streams, to lie down on the damp grass, or to those other rural delights so often mentioned by the poets; so the English themselves, though overflowing with humanity and benevo­lence, suffer clouds of gloomy thoughts to come over their minds, and, however they must be al­lowed to be good-natured, are seldom remarkable for being good-humoured. Yet this half-virtue is worth cultivation, as it bestows new charms on that real one. Good Humour is the fair-weather of the soul, that calms the turbulent gusts of passion, and diffuses a perpetual gladness and serenity over [Page 120] the heart; and he that finds his temper naturally inclined to break out into sudden bursts of fret­fulness and ill-humour, should be as much upon his guard to repress the storm, that is for ever beating in his mind, as to fence against the incle­mencies of the season. We are naturally attached even to animals that betray a softness of disposition. We are pleased with the aukward fondness and fi­delity of a dog: Montaigne could discover agree­able musick in the good-humoured purring of his cat; and, though our modern grooms and jockies bestow all their attention on make, colour, eyes, and feet, yet the best writers on horsemanship con­sider a good temper as one of the best qualities in a horse.

We should be the more attentive to encourage and preserve this pleasing quality, because many people lose it by little and little in the progress of their lives. The thoughts of interest frequently proves a growing rust and canker in the mind; and the many troubles and embarrassments at­tending worldly pursuits often sour the temper, and entirely destroy the spirit of chearfulness and Good Humour that prevailed in the artless and un­designing season of our youth. I do not know a more disagreeable companion, than a man, who, [Page 121] having set out in life with vast and vain hopes of advancement, together with a mighty consciousness of his own merit, has not been able to sustain the shock of disappointment, but has permitted his misfortunes to embitter his disposition. Such a man overflows with gall on every occasion, and discharges the spleen, that rises within him, on all his fellow-creatures. He disturbs the peace of the family to which he belongs, and poisons the hap­piness of every company to which he is admitted. But the disquiet that he brings with him, where­ever he comes, is nothing but an evidence of his own misery and weakness of soul. How much more is he to be imitated, who meets the strokes of fortune with an even temper, who suffers neither reproach nor distress to ruffle his Good Humour, and is, as Hamlet describes his friend, ‘"As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing!"’ Life is like a game at backgammon; and if an unlucky throw comes, we must make the best of it, and play on without grumbling at our ill luck: but who would venture to sit down to the table with a man who could not bear an adverse cast without turning over the board in a fury, and throwing the dice-box at the head of his companion? The character of Sir Thomas More, though peculiarly illustrious for [Page 122] unshaken integrity, was in no instance more winning and amiable than in true pleasantry and Good Hu­mour. His chearful behaviour on the scaffold, and in every particular relative to his death, is fa­miliar to all; but there is no circumstance in which the evenness of his mind is more truly delineated, than in his behaviour to his family on his resigna­tion of the Chancellorship. The way in which he discovered it to his wife bespoke the most genuine Good Humour. When he went out of church, it was always usual for some of his officers to go to his lady and acquaint her of his departure: but the Sunday after his resignation, he went himself up to her pew, and, bowing, gravely said, ‘" Madam, My Lord is gone."’ She, who was accustomed to the facetiousness of his manner, did not immedi­ately comprehend his meaning; but on his ex­plaining the matter to her, as they went home, she began to upbraid him for his shameful inattention to his interest; upon which, without being at all disconcerted by this conjugal lecture, he took oc­casion to turn the discourse, by finding fault with some part of her dress.—This absolute command of temper, and pleasant vein, is surely to be envied; and he who sees the goods of fortune fall from him, not only without shaking his fortitude, but also [Page 123] without abating the gaiety of his heart, may fairly be said to possess an uncommon share of Good Humour.

SURLY is a man of an easy fortune, humane and benevolent in his nature, and, as Dogberry says, ‘"honest as the skin between his brows;"’ but he has contracted a kind of habitual peevishness, and every common occasion of life affords him matter of offence. The instant he rises in the morning, he is disquieted with the appearance of the weather, and pours forth execrations on the climate; and when he sits down to breakfast, the water is smoaked, the butter rank, the bread heavy, the news-paper dull and insipid, and his servant sulky or imper­tinent: yet all the while, he has no malice in his mind, and means no harm to any creature in the world. He has a thousand good qualities, which the quickness of his temper converts into petulance and ill humour. He is a great lover of wit, but cannot bear the least piece of pleasantry on himself; and the most innocent jest touches him to the quick. He will bestow twenty pounds in an act of charity, or do the kindest offices to serve an acquaintance in distress, and the next mo­ment quarrel with his friend for disturbing his reflection by humming an opera-tune. Thus [Page 124] SURLY lives, much esteemed, and little beloved; and though every body thinks well of him, there are very few that care to cultivate his acquaintance.

But if the want of Good Humour is so conspi­cuous in a man, of how many charms does it deprive one of the other sex! softness is their dis­tinguishing characteristick; but though, like milk, they are naturally smooth, yet, like milk, they create particular disgust when they turn sour. No female character is more offensive than a Shrew; and the impolite spirit of the English law has provided very rough treatment for termagants, and pre­pared the severest discipline for the cure of a scold. The greatest reproach on an old maid, that cha­racter so much dreaded and ridiculed in the female world, is her ill humour; and crossness is the worst part of a prude. On the contrary, Good Humour, like the Cestus, encircles the fair one with new beauties, and is an antidote to the ravages of age and the small-pox. It is the best part of the portion with a virtuous wife, and a most amiable feature in the face of a Queen.

Among our own sex, there is no race of men more apt to indulge a spirit of acrimony, and to remit their natural Good Humour, than authors. They come abroad, indeed, with a consummate self-satisfaction [Page 125] and delight; but the least shock given to their vanity taints the mind, and converts all their pleasantry to rancour. The flame of emu­lation often kindles into envy; and these met­tlesome gentlemen press so furiously onward to the goal of fame, that they are sometimes driven to the necessity of jostling one onother in the course. For my part, I would rather chuse to consider myself on a journey than in a race; and surely it is better and pleasanter to jog on in an easy trot, regardless who is left behind, or who is gone before, than to whip and spur a jaded Genius, and, in the heat of furious spleen and blind rage, to be carried perhaps on the wrong side of the post.

Good Humour is the happiest state of mind for a writer, as well as for every other man. Why should an author suffer every hornet of the press to ruffle his temper, or dip his pen in gall, and prepare wormwood draughts to sweeten the ill blood of a cotemporary? He that causelesly and malignantly traduces another, writes a libel on himself; as the highwayman, who makes an attack upon the road, is, in fact, a greater enemy to himself than to the harmless traveller: such a poor wretch, we know, as well as the rest of the gang, will be [Page 126] brought to justice sooner or later; but no body cares to have their deaths lie at his own door. As for the GENIUS, though he ventures to become a Censor, he will never descend to the office of Ex­ecutioner. Even the Muse of Satire should possess her graces; and her productions, like the Sweet­brier, should delight and refresh the senses by their fragrance, while they are armed for our annoyance. If we cannot exercise the instruments of wit, we can at least lay by the weapons of offence and ill nature; and the candour of the British Publick will always countenance the faintest efforts to railly the reigning vices and foibles of the age with chearfulness, pleasantry, and GOOD HUMOUR.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER XIII.

TALKING the other evening with a friend, who is somewhat of a philosophical turn, and loves to deal in abstruse speculations, he fell by degrees into a whimsical vein, and endeavoured to amuse himself and me by considering physically, not to say metaphisically, the probable causes to which the strange diversities of temper and under­standing among mankind are owing. At one time he supposed, that several fortuitous circumstances [Page 128] at our birth might produce this variety; and that such an accident as the dilation or compression of the head by the hand of the nurse or the midwife, might determine the infant's future qualities, and mould a hero out of a coward; or squeeze a poet, or a philosopher, into a fool. He had also some conceits about the Homunculus, which, however, I shall not presume to explain at present, as a re­verend friend of mine, who is deeply versed in those studies, has promised to oblige me with a distinct paper on that subject. He then considered the notions of planetary influence; according to which, all the various actions and dispositions of the human species are governed solely by the stars. On this occasion, he assured me, that an eminent astronomer of his acquaintance was very fatal at casting nativities; and, moreover, that the late re­volution in the ministry was absolutely foretold last year in Partridge's Almanack. He dwelt a little on the supposition of the stubborn race of mortals being formed from the stones thrown, as is related by Ovid, over the heads of Deucalion and Pyrrha. From thence he made a quick transition to that kindred Hypothesis, which supposes, that our frames are kneaded out of clay; in pursuance of which, he thought, it was natural to imagine, that the [Page 129] affections of the mind take their tincture from the vessel in which they are inclosed, and are impreg­nated, like water, with the qualities of the purer, or baser earth through which they make their way.

With these reflections, the bottle and the cover­sation, as is usual among Englishmen, ended to­gether, and I retired to my rest. Yet I found it impossible to shake off at once the vein of thought which we had been indulging for three or four hours together; and sleep itself, instead of to­tally dispossessing my mind of those ideas, rather opened and enlarged my imagination to pursue them still further.—The gentle reader is seldom averse to accompanying the gentle writer in his slumbers; wherefore I shall venture to relate my dream.

I was scarce asleep, when I fancied myself to be transported on a sudden to the verge of the Gulph of Chaos; where, by the transient glimmering of an interrupted light, which now and then flashed upon me, I saw the Four Elements lying in confusion on the boundless deep, wherein, as Milton has described it,

[Page 130]I was much affected with the horror of my situ­ation, and expected every moment to be plunged ten thousand fathom deep into the gulph that lay before me, when there emerged from the waves, if I may so call them, of this elemental ocean, a Being of a mild and benevolent aspect, who, after landing on an eminence at some distance, beckoned me towards him with a sort of Caduceus, which he held in his hand, and which was formed in the shape of a Lizard, to signify that he was a friend to Mankind. My fear had deprived me of all power of motion; but the power of his rod drew me insensibly to his side, as it were by a charm. His person was manly and noble: a serene chearfulness was diffused over his countenance: his garment was thrown loosely over him, somewhat after the fashion of a Herald's Coat; and on the four quarters of it were delineated the figures of the Mole, the Whale, the Salamander, and the Camelion, as symbols of the Four Elements, over which, as it appeared, he presided.

My son! saith he, I am the Genius of the Elements. In the vast abyss now before us lie all the future race of Mankind, as it were, in em­brio. It is the business of certain spirits, over which I preside, to select from thence the crude [Page 131] materials, of which all Human Beings are com­posed. You, I know, are curious not only to en­quire into the various dispositions of your fellow-creatures, but to investigate the causes, to which their different manners and principles are owing. These causes I am now going to declare to you; wherefore attend!

Every Mortal is composed of the Four Elements, but not in equal proportions, nor each mortal in the same degrees with another. On the contrary, men are, severally, more or less agitated with this or that passion, or animated with a greater or smaller proportion of Genius, according to the nature of the particular Element that predominates in their frame; which prevailing Element, whether it be Earth, Water, Air, or Fire, creates the Ruling Passion, and influences every circumstance of their lives.

In yonder quarter, continued the GENIUS, are formed the sons and daughters of Earth; those mortals, I mean, who take their existence chiefly from that Element. These are, for the most part, of a heavy and inanimate disposition, of groveling souls and dull minds, and may be rather said to vegetate than to live. A few, and very few of the Female Sex are composed of this Element; [Page 132] and these are sluttish in their houses, slatternly in their persons, and churlish to their friends, rela­tions, and husbands. Those of the Male Sex, that owe their origin principally to Earth, are those miserly muckworms, who place their sole happiness in amassing vast sums of money; those locusts and caterpillars, who eat out the substance of others by extortion and usury. From this Element also are fabricated the race of stupid criticks, and heavy commentators, half-philosophers, entire logicians, dry metaphysicians, and muddling politicians; together with the whole tribe of wretched scrib­blers, whom your countrymen have so properly distinguished by the denomination of Grubs. The particles of which these mortals are formed, weigh down their minds, and prevent their soaring to any thing lofty or sublime; for the same reason that fathers, according to the principle of that fa­mous chancellor Lord Coke, cannot take an estate by inheritance from their sons, viz. because Land, or Earth, being of a heavy nature, cannot ascend. There are, however, among mortals of this terrene com­position, some who possess solid parts and sound un­derstandings; and many, whose minds are not barren or unfruitful, if they labour to improve them by due cultivation.

[Page 133]On the banks of that Lake, said the GENIUS, pointing to another quarter, are created that part of the human species, who draw their life and being from Water. These are commonly found to be cold and phlegmatick in their disposition; men, who shelter their native dulness and inactivity under the names of caution and prudence; who damp the generous warmth of youth, repress the ardour of enterprize, and quench the flame of Genius; women, who can cry when they please; soaking sots, who are far ever moistening their clay, till they grow maudlin in their liquor, and weep; lovers, who whine away their days in despair, till at last they take the Lovers'-Leap into their kindred sea, or drown like blind puppies, in Rosamond's Pond; tragick authors and actors, who want fire, and draw tears from no eyes but their own: all these owe their origin to Water. Among these watry souls, there are indeed some few, that may be considered as salutiferous springs, that are bene­ficial to their fellow-creatures; or, like noble rivers, which are an ornament, as well as blessing, to the country through which they pass.

Now, said the GENIUS, raising his head, turn your eyes upward, and behold the region from whence they take their being, who are composed [Page 134] chiefly of Air. These are in general of a light and volatile disposition; often fed with vain hopes, and pleased with empty trifles. Hence are derived the gay race of beaux and fops, who flutter, like but­terflies, about the polite world; and in this airy sphere are formed coquettes, jilts, and those females, who are enraptured with romance, or eternally dying with the vapours. Hence descend poets, pro­jectors, and castle-builders without number, who seem to be perpetually endeavouring to climb up to the region from whence they came; and the long train of dependants, who seem to have almost learnt to live, like the Camelion, on their native element, the Air. Hence come the light troop of Essayists, Pamphleteers, Sonneteers, Epigrammatists, &c. whose productions have their beginning in Air, and end in Fire. Of this Element too are com­posed some daring souls, who take their bold flight, like eagles, and soar to the noblest heights; though never without being followed for a time with a multitude of crows, choughs, and ravens, who pursue them with hoarse and dissonant cawings, and disturb earth and heaven with their clamour.

Lastly, continued the GENIUS, behold the bright district where those mortals are formed, who are composed principally of Fire. These are, for the [Page 155] most part, of a warm and passionate nature; amongst whom the virtues and vices are to be found in their extremes. Here too you may find men of hot heads, and ladies of warm constitutions. Hence comes the termagant, who is all rage and fury, and the hero, who is all glory and gunpowder. Hence also comes the spirited race of bucks, bloods, libertines, and freethinkers. Hence too are derived many of those glorious and sublime sages, heroes, princes, poets, and philosophers, whose Genius throws a lustre all around them, and who seem to be placed, like beacons, amidst the human species, to hold forth lights to the rest of the world.

Happy, said the GENIUS, is he, who has learnt to temper the irregularities of his frame, so as to prevent the evil effects of the Element that prevails in his composition! Happier still is that man, in whom the Elements are mixed in the nearest pro­portion to each other.

At these words, whether from sudden noise, suf­ficient rest, a desire to reply, or from what other cause I know not—I awoke.

THE GENIUS, NUMBER XIV.

BATH, and Tunbridge, and Cheltenham, and Scarborough, and the other Watering Places of this kingdom, although many miles distant from the metropolis, and some of them scarce to be brought within the compass of a day's journey, even in this age of expedition, when [Page 137] the flying waggon is no extraordinary Phaenomenom, may yet be justly considered as places of publick diversion belonging to the town. The Rooms in no wise resemble other country assemblies, where the squire commands respect, and derives additional authority from being in the commission of the peace; and the balls are quite in a different stile from a dance at the assizes, where the alder­mens' wives and daughters set off with the newest patterns, from London, are admitted to drop a curtsy to the ladies of the representatives for the town or country, or, perhaps, even to the Lady Lieutenant. On the contrary, the company of these places make up the same fantastical medley, nay, consists of the very same persons as occasionally compose the groupe in the places of entertain­ment in and about London; and while we are sure to encounter the well-known faces that haunt every house and garden whose doors are thrown open to receive them, notwithstanding the real distance, we can scarce suppose ourselves beyond the limits of the bills of mortality, any more than we are apt to fancy ourselves out of town, when we have just got off the stones towards Vauxhall or Ranelagh.

[Page 138]In this light, at least, I was tempted to con­sider this matter in a late trip to Bath—with this only difference: in town, the company is brought together for a few hours only; and though some may have repaired thither on foot, some in equipages decorated with bloody hands and co­ronets, and others in coaches distinguished by square plates of painted tin, yet, on their separa­tion, who can tell what becomes of his late asso­ciates, any more than where they came from? At Bath, and the like places, each person may be said not only to exhibit himself for a time, but even to live in publick. He resides in a house of glass, and all his words, actions, pleasures, and at­tachments, are known to the whole circle of the little world he inhabits. Neither my lord, nor my lady, who disdain to sin in private, nor the petty trespasser, who loves to be snug in his offences, are exempt from observation. Almost every body descants on the characters of others, and almost every body exposes his own. It is a kind of ge­neral hob or nob, or give and take, as Shakespeare explains the phrase, between all the good com­pany. The old, the young, the rich, the poor, the sick, the well, English, French, Germans, Swiss, and Italians, all live here together, as it were, in [Page 139] one family; and with as little emotion of mutual concern or regard, as those who are really of one family, commonly have for each other.

Bath no more owes its entire support to mere in­valids, than the universities are filled with real stu­dents; or than the Temple coffee houses are totally maintained by lawyers that have business, or Child's and Batson's by physicians that have practice. If every saunterer in the Pump-Room was to be strictly interrogated concerning the motive of his coming thither, or the manner of his passing his time there, dissipation, play, and intrigue, would appear to have drawn after them a larger retinue than the gout or the cholick. A person, who is fond of taking an estimate of manners and prin­ciples, might find here much matter of specula­tion. For my own part, being too poor to game, too well to drink the waters, too dull, or too brisk, too wise, or too foolish, too insensible, or too what you will, to fall in love, I remained an idle spec­tator of the busy scene before me; and like a dull geographer, without pretending to account for the nature of the soil, or to discover the several springs and mines that lay underneath, I contented myself with taking a cursory survey of the place, [Page 140] and drawing out a map from what appeared on the face of the country.

It affords abundant matter of congratulation to this kingdom, that notorious games of hazard, such as the E. O. Tables, and the like, are at length banished from these places, as well as from the mas­querade and ridotto. There are still, it is true, to be found several hungry cormorants, eager to feed on the ignorant or unwary; and studious to make use of the opportunities arising from the pro­miscuous mixture of the cheat and the dupe, the gentleman and the sharper. They, however, who are weak enough to fall a prey to these sharks of society, are the less to be pitied, as they seem to devote themselves to destruction with their eyes open. The characters of these vagrant gamblers are generally notorious. He, therefore, who ven­tures his hundreds against the last stake of a fellow, whom he would not admit into his house, or speak to, but across the card-table, surely suffers himself to be robbed, while he feels the hand of the cut-purse in his pocket; and has no more right to complain of ill treatment, than if he had descended to play with link-boys, and pick pockets in a night cellar.

[Page 141]Far be it from me to endeavour, with rude hand, to force open the cabinet of love, or to unlock the secrets of the Temple of Cupid! Love, how­ever determined on secrecy, is apt to break out and betray itself unawares, to make itself known by a thousand little inadvertencies and absurdities in our conduct, the involuntrary emotions of ten­derness. Rather, therefore, would I admonish these sweet triflers, in the supposed words of Cassio to Desdemona, ‘" let us be wary! let us bide our loves!"’ in order to which, let them abstain from billing and cooing in publick, from rolling of eyes, and squeezing of hands, and joining of knees under the table! Idleness and curiosity are ever on the watch; and Scandal, like Virgil's Fame, has as many eyes as tongues. It is a maxim at Bath, and all other publick places, that when a young couple have been partners at a ball for two nights to­gether, every other point is settled between them; whereon the banns of marriage are published in the Rooms, long before the time for their declaration any where else. Making love may be, and no doubt is, a very engaging entertainment to the parties concerned; but there is no scene of courtship, which does not appear exttemely ridi­culous in the eyes of an indifferent spectator.

[Page 142]But if the sparks of honourable love are, in these common haunts of men, to be thus cautiously repressed from bursting into a blaze, what shall we say to the unwarrantable ebullitions of the spirit of intrigue? If a fine lady, just broke loose from her husband, or a warm widow lately relieved from the yoke of matrimony, have a mind to give their passions full play, why need they advertise their in­tentions to the whole world? Or, if a sprightly young fellow has subdued some frail piece of fe­male virtue, is it not cruel to make his conquest publick? In a word, why should both parties prefer an open scorn of virtue and decorum to the concealment of their vices? It would be too rigid and unreasonable to debar persons of spirit en­tirely from their pleasures. I would only advise them to be temperate and discreet in the use of them. The cuckoldly husband might put his horns quietly into his pocket, if he was not industriously pointed out for a monster; and the world might wink hard at female frailties, if they did not provoke atten­tion, and peremptorily challenge observation. Open gallantries are sure to become the subject of town-talk; and the rumour of Bath and Tunbridge intrigues is as quickly calculated through the [Page 143] best company, as a box on the ear indiscreetly dealt at Ranelagh.

There is no part of these mixt assemblies, which I am apt to consider with more compassion, than those unfortunate young females, whose wise rela­tions are fond of carrying them to and fro, from one publick place to another, by way of introducing them early to the knowledge of the world, or as the means of getting them a husband. There is, indeed, no situation, where a decent and amiable be­haviour in a young lady would be more conspi­cuous: but those, who have been formed on the above-mentioned system of education, have com­monly lost all their domestick graces, without having acquired any allurements in exchange for them. They know the rules and customs of publick places, without being in the least acquainted with the manners of the world, which are not to be collected in a giddy life of perpetual dissipation, or learnt with the graces of a minuet, and the figure of a country dance, or picked up by chance at the lottery table; as a proof of which, it seldom hap­pens, that these female pupils of Flirtation con­tract an advantageous match, though they often fall a prey to the professed rake or libertine. Or, if that is not the case, they are hawked about [Page 144] from place to place, till the bloom is off the plum, when, (to pursue the allusion) many nauseate the fruit, so soon is grown dead and stale in the market, which perhaps they would have gathered with pleasure, if it had been left to hang its due time upon the tree.

If there are any characters of this motley drama that move our mirthful indignation more power­fully than all the others, it is the swarm of humble retainers to the Great, that are for ever buzzing in the ear of nobility. The easy intercourse be­tween persons of different ranks, which this place affords, is particularly grateful to these spunges, as Hamlet terms them, who delight to soak up the countenances of people of fashion. This nu­merous tribe is made up of both sexes; and happy is he or she who can be occasionally called in to fill up a vacant corner in her Grace's party at Qua­drille; and how woeful is the mortification, if they should fail to edge themselves into his Lordship's tea-drinking! Such self-made depen­dants, who are engendered by the smiles of the Great, like flies or maggots out of carrion by the rays of the sun, have no idea of any distinction between persons, except that which title bestows on them. They seem indeed to suppose themselves [Page 145] noble and genteel by reflection, though they sink in the estimation of others, in proportion as they rise in their own. They are considereed in ge­neral as runners to the great, that fetch and carry, come and go, as they are bid. Though they flatter themselves that they mix in the polite world, they live but in the suburbs and out-skirts of gen­tility. They are, in truth, but a mean appendage to the great, a higher, but yet more infamous degree, of pages and lacquies to hold up the tail of nobi­lity, or rather a contemptible part of the train itself; a narrow edging or border, a kind of beggar's tape that binds the hem of quality.

The late and ever-memorable Richard Nash, Esq. whose name is almost as much revered at Bath, as that of the great Bladud himself, for some few years before his death published proposals for printing, by subscription, The History of BATH and TUNBRIDGE. Many, who subscribed largely to this work, contrary to the case of all other sub­scriptions, would have been much disappointed and offended, if it had ever made its appearance; so that the price of subscription might be considered as hush-money, to keep the intrigues and gal­lantries of the nobility in silence. The original papers, containing many curious anecdotes, are [Page 146] fallen into my hands; and, unless the dukes and dutchesses, peers and peeresses, in general, and others the gentry of this realm, will subscribe their five guineas to me, The GENIUS, as nobly as they did to the first author, the work shall certainly come out. In the mean time, the manuscripts are lodged in the hands of an eminent counsel, as it is said was the case with some of Pope's Epistles and Satires, that we may be enabled to go just upon the edge of libel and scandalum magnatum. Those who would not have their adventures and amours recorded in this secret history, may take the gentle hint I now give them, and send in their subscrip­tions to the printer of this paper. In the mean time, I would recommend it to Messrs. Wiltshire and Simson at Bath, as well as to the proprietors of the pump-room, and masters of the coffee-houses, to hang the rooms with the ST. JAMES's CHRO­NICLE.

THE GENIUS. NUMBER XV.

ON my return home a few evenings ago, I found lying on my table a soiled knave of diamonds, bearing evident marks of having served in several campaigns, which I found, on exa­mination, to come from my old acquaintance, Mrs. Marrcourt, and to contain an invitation, written in her own old English black letter, to a private party at cards, on Monday the fourth of January.

Mrs. Marrcourt is the widow of a gentleman who had a place in the household, and at her hus­band's death obtained, by the interest and sollici­tation of some powerful friends, an annual pension [Page 148] of a hundred and fifty pounds. Having had, as she often says herself, a very genteel education, and always lived in a polite sphere, she entertains the most profound respect for all persons of fashion, as well as an implicit veneration for all the manners, appurtenances, and dependences, of quality. Wherefore, notwithstanding the nar­rowness of her income, she never could endure the thoughts of being exiled from the great world, but has been reduced to several shifts to maintain the appearance of a tolerable footing in it. Being now grown aged and infirm, she cannot well crawl through the park in fair weather, or along the best paved streets to pay her morning visits. She is, however, in possession of the cast sedan of a countess of her acquaintance, by whom she was honoured with it as a present seven years ago; but being un­able to pay her chairmen the usual rates for weekly attendance, she drives a hard bargain, and retains them at an under price; whence it often happens, that her two chairmen are not only in liveries of two different colours, but she is obliged to be car­ried by all the raw-boned, unpractised fellows, who jumble along in a rough trot, as uneasy as a stage-coach over the stones; and no sooner have they learnt to pace along in the true human amble, and [Page 149] become capable of better business, than they desert the good old lady, and their places are supplied by a fresh pair of hackney novices; so that she has 'the breaking-in of most of the two-legged colts in town. She has apartments in one of the old palaces, gratis; and during the summer-months, because she would not, for the world, be so ungenteel as to stay in London, she takes a two-penny lodging at Greenwich or Richmond. She constantly visits at several great houses, and though often shut out, by perseverance and the utmost good-breeding, she is sometimes let in, and perhaps, if there is no particular company, asked to stay dinner. The ladies treat her with a haughty familiarity, and stile her plain Marrcourt: and the facetious men of fashion make mock love to her, compliment her, in the strain of well­bred raillery, on her person, beauty, taste, and other qualifications; freely indulging themselves in all those liberties, which young fellows, con­scious and vain of their rank, are apt to take with their inferiors.—Yet, even from this kind of con­nection with people of distinction, does Mrs. Marr­court derive no small degree of consequence. She remembers the day she bought her last pound of tea, by recollecting it was the same on which she [Page 150] dined at his lordship's; she talks familiarly of Lady Harriot and Lady Mary; and is reckoned, by all the lower gentry of her acquaintance, to be a mighty genteel sort of body, and to keep none but the very best of company.

I waited on Mrs. Marrcourt on the evening appointed, but perceived, immediately on my entrance into her apartments, that although she had given her assembly the modest appellation of a private party, she had in fact collected all the company she was able, with a particular view to bring together some persons of rank and dignity. Her two rooms, the largest of which is scarce bigger than a cabin, and the least a mere closet, were so crouded, that it was with the utmost difficulty that I could squeeze my little person sideways between the backs of the chairs belonging to the several card tables, in order to make my way from one end of the place to the other. The tables were, many of them, placed diagonally, by which means she had been able to edge in one or two extraordinary; and most of the company, who were not put down to cards, stood in a huddle by the fire-side, and the remaining few had disposed themselves in the seats of the windows. The room was lighted up with the ends of wax-candles, [Page 151] bought of the duke of —'s butler, and the company regaled with a small liquor, made by Mrs. Marrcourt herself, in the present scarcity of lemons, of the best Cream o'Tartar. The com­pany itself was as miscellaneous as a pack of cards, or any hand that can be formed from different combinations of them; but the most distinguished members of it, and to which I observed Mrs. Marr­court paid particular attention, were, an old Irish peer, of a disputed title, a Creolian colonel, a dis­tressed baronet, a city knight and his lady, a French gentlewoman from the neighbourhood of Soho, an old general officer on half-pay, and a yellow ad­miral.

Such is the faithful picture of the good old lady's assembly; and without pretending to more than ordinary penetration, we may venture to pronounce that there are many Mrs. Marrcourts in this great metropolis. Nor is it any matter of surprise; for if ladies of distinction will delight to throw open their great gates, and court the whole tide of no­bility to flow in upon them, there will ever exist these minor dames of second-hand gentry, fond of aping the vices and follies of their superiors. But though the imitation of bad things, like the cor­ruption of the best, renders them most odious and [Page 152] contemptible, it may not be amiss to carry our re­flections still further, and to consider the nature of the politest of these assemblies, set off with every circumstance of elegance and splendor.

These genteel meetings, like Milton's Pandaemo­nium, frequent and full, are, in the dialect of the fashionable world, denominated ROUTS; the signi­fication of which word, according to dictionaries of the best authority, is as follows, Johnson defines a ROUT to be a clamorous multitude; a rabble; a tumultuous croud: and Giles Jacob, in his Law Dictionary, declares the word ROUT to signify an ASSEMBLY of persons, gathered together, and going to execute, or indeed executing, an unlawful act. If we examine the thing itself as it appears in high life, we shall be convinced of the propriety of the term, and cannot but allow that all these ROUTS, from that of a dutchess down to Mrs. Marrcourt's, come within the meaning of both these descriptions. For what is a ROUT but a tu­multuous croud; a rabble; that is, a genteel mob, or the rabble of quality, drawn together, as Jacob says, and going to execute, or indeed executing, an un­lawful act?

But the prevailing idea is, undoubtedly, the Croud; and the lady, who is mistress of the ROUT, [Page 153] is happy in proportion to the numbers she has been able to assemble. If the publick way is interrupted for three streets together, and the company can scarce get to and fro between the house and their coaches and chairs; if the boxes at the play or the opera are robbed of their company, because those, who are left uninvited, are ashamed to betray the contempt or neglect they are doomed to sustain; if in the most spacious apartments in London, the company are crouded together, as close as at Mrs. Marrcourt's, or as the poor pri­soners in the black-hole at Calcutta; the triumph is more ample and complete. I remember a dutchess and a countess, who for a time entertained the most mortal aversion for each other, from having both appointed their Routs on the same day of the week. The whole town, at least the polite part of it, was divided into parties; and ranking them­selves, as under a banner, beneath the colours of the cards, were severally called the Reds and the Blacks. The parties being equally powerful, and the Routs of each being of course rendered less numerous, who can say to what extremities matters might have been carried, if a man of fashion, who, like a blank card, had yet received no impression either from Red or Black, had not [Page 154] fortunately compromised the affair, and pre­vailed on the ladies to be content with taking the day alternately, each holding a Rout only once in a fortnight?

It is remarkable, that this rage for a Croud has produced a most extraordinary revolution in dress. A friend of mine has composed a most ela­borate treatise, in the manner of Montesquieu, on the causes of the rise and fall of the hoop-petticoat. In the learned section on the subject of ROUTS, which is as curious as any chapter in Tristram Shandy, the author has plainly demonstrated, that these assemblies have produced a total revolution in architecture and dress. Every house is built as if it was intended to receive the whole town; and every lady is drest as if she was going into apart­ments where she would not have room to turn herself round. The hoop, which had stood the shocks of ridicule for forty years together, which dilated itself wider and wider on every new attack, which incumbered whole apartments, spread itself all over the Mall, eclipsed beaux, and oversha­dowed side-boxes, shrunk in an instant, like a flower shut up at sunset, or a closed umbrella. No Hoops became the common Nota Bene to all cards of invitation; and the ladies came abroad, [Page 155] suddenly freed of all their tumours and incum­brances, like a new mother just delivered of her burthen, or like the fallen angels in Milton, as on a signal given,

It may almost be asserted, without a quibble, that the system of life, now established in the polite world, seems calculated to destroy society for the sake of company. A Lady's Journal is a mere calendar of visits and routs; visits often paid by the footmen, with a slip of card and a flam­beau; and Routs, where, instead of a few select friends, she meets with a croud of half acquaintance and strangers. ROUTS are the modern schools of education for the female sex; and as cards seem to be destined for their sole amusement and employ­ment, I would advise my good friend Mr. Newberry, the annual publisher of the Ladies Me­morandum Book, to dispose his next into the po­pular form of a pack of cards, the two and fifty cards, of which the pack consists, naturally adapting themselves to the use of the two and fifty weeks, into which the year is distributed. The [Page 156] several Sundays might be distinguished as the first, second, third, or fourth Sundays of the dutchess of A's, the countess of B's, lady Van D's, or Mrs. E's Rout; and the little spaces allotted for ap­pointments, might be filled with secret assigna­tions, if it be true, (as the Chronicle of Scandal relates) that such assignations are sometimes made at these assemblies.

I have been the more earnest to throw together my reflections on this subject at present, because the female passion for ROUTS grows every day more and more predominant, and I am credibly in­formed that the contagion has actually spread even to our colonies, and been carried by our country-women into other parts of the world. General Assemblies, of no parliamentary nature, I am told, are frequently held in New England; the clerks of our East-India Company and their wives have, it is said, been known to lose a lack of rupees at a sitting at Bengal; and I am confidently assured, that a lady of quality, on her travels, has so far broke in upon the simplicity of the Cantons, as to have absolutely established an evening assembly for halfpenny Lu in Switzerland.

In order, therefore, to prevent the further evil consequences resulting from these private publick [Page 157] gaming-houses, and at the same time not entirely to deprive persons of distinction of their favourite amusement, and yet to render it of some small utility and advantage, I would humbly submit to the attention of the legislature the following plan of a ROUT-ACT. No lady, of whatsoever rank, should be allowed to hold in one night more than three card-tables for Whist, Cribbage, or Quadrille; which, with a fourth for the use of the more promiscuous games, such as Lansquenet, Lu, Lottery, &c. may fairly be supposed to comprehend all the persons that can meet at once for the sake of society. But, for the entertainment of those, who delight in larger assemblies, two publick ROUTS should be instituted, with authority to open their doors every night, like the theatres: one to be held, for the use of the court end of the town, at Carlisle House, Soho Square; and the other, for the ladies of the merchants, aldermen, and common-council men, at Haberdasher's-Hall in the city. The card-money, as well as the sums subscribed for admission, (instead of being lavished on butlers, valets, and maitres d'hotel) should be laid apart, in order to create a fund for the support of decayed gamesters, whose necessities might be supplied by their successors at the gaming-table, as the stage [Page 158] now and then gives a benefit for distrest and super­annuated actors. By these means a lord, who has exhausted his fortune by deep play, need not degrade himself by application for a pension; and a merchant who has, by the like conduct, involved himself and family in the miseries of bankruptcy, need not do the world and his creditors a further injury by going into business again.

THE GENTLEMAN. NUMBER I.

OF all bodies of men, Authors may justly claim the largest share of publick spirit. Stre­nuous advocates for the rights of the people, they have not only even shewn themselves vigilant guardians of the liberty of the press, but have also recently manifested a noble contempt for what appeared to be their own more immediate concern, [Page 162] the property of the press; a property which they have lately seen voted away with a true stoical apathy and indifference. They have silently be­held, like unconcerned spectators, its very existence denied, and have acquiesced in the sublime doctrine of disinterestedness to the greatest extreme. Phy­sicians and lawyers avowedly plead and prescribe for a fee, soldiers fight for pay, and even divines preach and pray for a benefice. The labourer, in other stations, is reckoned worthy of his hire. Authors alone are content to have little other re­compense than fame for their labours, and quietly allow that a general imprimatur converts their works into general property. The industrious commonwealth of literature has been plundered of the wax and honey, without one of the exhaustless hive endeavouring to fix his sting into his spoilers: but in vindication of the liberty of the press, not a drone but would join in instant commotion.

The Liberty of the Press is indeed a most glorious privilege. When it is but mentioned every En­glishman swells with a conscious superiority, and seems to feel himself half an inch taller; if on the Continent, the thought almost adds a cubit to his stature; yet this liberty, invaluable as it is, like all other liberty, has been shamefully abused; and has [Page 163] oftentimes been exercised with the barbarity of sa­vages, rather than the gallant spirit of freemen; by monsters wielding the pen, not as the sword of publick justice or defence, but using it as the in­strument of ruffian violence and private rancour. In political discussions, indeed, freedom of senti­ment and speech should be almost boundless: and a great and enterprising genius, best able to go all lengths, might perhaps with great propriety try, ‘"how far the Liberty of the Press could legally be carried:"’ but in writings of a private nature, that doctrine becomes shameful and scandalous, and the practice almost diabolical. He who exercises the Liberty of the Press, with no farther idea of restraint, than what the law imposes, may escape a partial prosecution, but will incur universal contempt: for the rogue within the law, as any attorney can testify, is the most dangerous and des­picable of all rogues. In a moral as well as a civil sense, every man's house should in some measure be his castle; and the miscreant who wantonly disturbs the repose, or breaks into the harmless secrets, of a private family, commits a kind of literary bur­glary, and is almost as culpable as the minister or king's messenger who should now attempt the seisure of papers, or dare to enter a mansion by a [Page 164] General Warrant. The English are a remarkably good-natured, as well as generous people; but were a stranger to form a character of them from a perusal of their daily publications, they would ap­pear to require a constant evening sacrifice to their ill-nature, and a hecatomb of reputations for their breakfast.

Seeing the colour of many other publications, and those, alas, too generally popular, I mean oc­casionally to hazard an essay in this paper, of a complection totally different, and now and then to rescue at least one column, in one news-paper, from scandal and politicks. The recess of parliament, when the minds of men are less heated by con­tention, is a proper season to commence such an undertaking. For my own part, I am at present writing inclined to trust the interests of my country, on both sides of the Atlantick, to the three great branches of the legislature; but if I find them in­adequate or unfaithful, I shall be happy with other authors to embody, like the constitutional militia, in times of danger, and to change the Gentleman into the Politician, as Steele converted the Guardian into the Englishman. Even Quakers perhaps might, on such an occasion, suspend the pacifick tenets of their persuasion; and even some of our Clergy [Page 165] would, in such circumstances, exhibit a new idea of Church Militant, change their gowns for coats of mail, and like a boiled lobster, turn from black to red.

It is however at present my wish and my intention to suffer my patriotick powers of writing to sleep, like the sword in the scabbard. Every Gentleman chuses to wear one both for ornament and defence, but when he puts it on, says to himself with Mercutio, ‘"Heaven send me no need of thee!"’ I will not, like the court-fool of old times, run a muck against the King and his Nobles; I will not draw my wit upon the Minister; much less (as I have already professed) will I wound the bosom of domestick tranquillity. I send these fu­gitive papers smiling into the world, wishing them, like Swedes' Tea, to sweaten the blood and juices of my Countrymen, and to correct their ill hu­mours; but tho' intended for an antidote to black bile and acrimony, it is hoped they will not appear, like Magnesia, a cure for the heart-burn indeed, but in themselves a drug tasteless and insipid. The rose and sweet-briar are not the less fragrant for the thorn that makes a part of them; and the powers of satire and ridicule, while pointed at ge­neral vices and enormities, are not only innocent [Page 166] but salutary. Bungling quacks cannot attack the disease, without injuring or perhaps killing the patient: but the true moralist sees the drama of so­ciety performed before him, like the skilful natu­ralist contemplating bees through a glass hive, marking their operations, and turning them to account, without offering the busy insects the least injury. The present age swarms with follies, and teems with characters worthy of observation. Such will be frequently exhibited; but as they are in­tended, like those of the New Comedy of Me­nander, to be general, it is hoped that none of them will be challenged by any individual.

The Motto prefixed to this Indroductory Essay may perhaps be thought arrogant; but it is only meant to imply such subjects as are fit for discussion on a plan of this liberal nature, and such a cha­racter as the writer would wish to exhibit in the person of The Gentleman: not that he presumes to hint that he shall himself be found equal to it. He means to derive his chief importance from the merits of others. As to himself, whether really a Gentleman, or the meanest Plebeian; a student at his ease, or a scribbler in the Fleet; sitting by a silver standish in his own apartment, or with a broken ink-bottle in a garret or cellar; are matters [Page 167] of no importance to the reader, so long as the author shall sustain the part he has assumed. Though appearing in a publick character, he means to be nameless and unknown. He has drawn up the curtain, like other managers, without ad­mittance behind the scenes, an indulgence which might gratify the curiosity of a few, but tends to destroy the publick entertainment. In his bills the director can at present announce no more than The Gentleman, to which the wags (if they please) may subjoin, being the first time of his appearing in that character. I must beg leave, however, once for all to declare, that with whatever notice they may honour me, to their wit or their dulness I shall never make any reply; not from the spirit of silent contempt, but rather on the principle of Fielding, who when he was told in the Green Room that the audience were damning his Comedy, acquiesced in the badness of it, and cried, What! have they found it out!

It has heen suggested to me, that it would be more consonant to the character of a Gentleman, to send forth my speculations, like some of my predecessors, uncontaminated by paragraphs and advertisements, beautifully printed on a sheet and half of fine writing paper: but many of my [Page 168] superiors, several excellent essayists, moral and political, have written in news-papers. As to that, in which The Gentleman has chosen to insert his Productions, he has distinguished it on a prin­ciple of publick spirit; having observed it for some time past to have been the deadest, dullest, most unentertaining and insipid of the many Journals and Chronicles which the press groans under at present; a circumstance the more extraordinary, as it is, he is informed, the property of a junto of the sprightliest, wittiest, politest, and most learned spirits of the age; capable of instructing and enli­vening it with every species of composition, from History down to a Pun or an Epigram. The very Printer, Mr. William Woodfall, if Fame say true, is able, like the silkworm, to weave his own rich materials, and, after the example of the Stevens's and Elzevirs, to be himself the editor of any produc­tions that might issue from his press. To stimulate therefore these capable but indolent geniusses, to rouse them from their lethargy, to set all hands to work on board the London Pacquet, is the design and ambition of The Gentleman; happy, if like Falstaff, he should at any time be found to be witty himself, but content if he can at least, like Falstaff, be the cause of wit in other men.

THE GENTLEMAN. NUMBER II.

IT is usual with those who exhibit their perfor­mances to the Publick, to follow up their first effort with an account of the great and un­common applause that has been bestowed on it. As I have always imagined such accounts to be re­ligiously true, I cannot help considering myself as deplorably unpopular, or peculiarly unfortunate. I have not heard a syllable uttered in favour of the first Number of The Gentleman, and almost all the readers I expected to interest or engage, have been occupied with the Sessions Paper or the [Page 170] London Gazette. I have not seen a single copy of verses in praise of my style, and I have even been assured by my friends, that the people of this country will not at present read any article in a news­paper longer than a paragraph. I have however been honoured with the notice of two corre­spondents; and as they seem inclined, on certain conditions, to become assistants in my present un­dertaking, I shall introduce them to my readers by making their Letters publick, before I proceed in my own speculations.

[Page 173]According to my Correspondent's definition, my idea of a Gentleman, and his idea of a Blackguard, constitute pretty nearly the same character. I think, indeed, he bears rather hard upon the FINE Gentleman of our age, and handles him with more roughness than so tender an animal provokes; yet it must be confessed that the writer's rusticity, becomes him, and (as Addison says of Virgil in his Georgicks) that ‘"he tosses about his dung with an air of gracefulness."’ I cannot therefore dismiss his epistle without assuring him, that I wish for a continuance of his correspondence, as well as that of the Lady, who has favoured me with the fol­lowing Letter.

Till the Lady becomes acquainted with my name, character, and qualifications, she is desired to take it for granted that I am very tall, very well [Page 177] made, exactly of the complection she likes best, and just in my prime. In the mean time I most thankfully accept her kind offer, and do not doubt but it will be agreeable to my fair readers. The ladies have indeed betrayed some partiality for male hair-dressers, stay-makers, mantua-makers, and even men-midwives: yet I think they will un­bosom their failings more freely to one of their own sex; and any lady, labouring with spleen, malice, envy, ambition, avarice, or secret disorders of the mind, will be glad to be laid by a woman: especially as an able and experienced practitioner (meaning myself) will always attend, ready to assist in any very nice case or an accident.

THE GENTLEMAN. NUMBER III.

LEARNING, like beaten gold, in proportion to its being more extended, becomes more superficial. Gross ignorance and profound eru­dition are now equally uncommon. Literature, [Page 179] no longer confined to colleges and cloisters, mixes itself in some measure with the commerce of the exchange, the exercises of the camp, and the graces of the court: but the deep-read scholar is a rarer character than ever. The main stream of science, branching into numberless rivulets, grows shallow, as well as clear. The stores of learning are parcelled out by retail, and what was sarcastically said of the reputed knowledge of our northern neighbours, is nearly applicable to that of the whole island. Every man has a mouthfull, but no man has a bellyfull.

This observation, on the state of learning in ge­neral, is almost equally true in respect to the lesser [Page 180] graces of Style and composition. That happy me­diocrity, denied by Gods and Men to the writers of former ages, has been reserved for our own period. Few writers are barbarous and ungram­matical, or even unmusical, in their language; but very few are truly simple, nervous, or elegant. Some styles, like handsome faces, are spoilt by affectation, or ruined by varnish and extrinsick or­nament; some are bloated with false pomp; some darkened by metaphysical abstract phraseology; and some enervated by dapper familiarities, and the cant jargon of drawing-rooms, horse-courses, and gaming-tables.

Purity of Style, like purity of manners, is not wholly practicable: languages, like men by whom they are framed, will be imperfect: yet every en­deavour to trace the sources of corruption, tends to stop its progress. Living authors, as well as living manners, are at once the chief objects of our censure and imitation. The works of deceased writers, which we have been taught by tradition to applaud, are too seldom turned over; while the productions of our cotemporaries present them­selves to our notice, oftener than their persons. He, who has talents to distinguish himself from [Page 181] the crowd, has more followers than an ancient phi­losopher. A popular writer sets the fashion of Style, and the very herd of criticks, that wish to depre­ciate the value of his works, run after him. If an author arises, whose deep learning, and large imagination struggling for expression equal to his conceptions, tempt him to lengthen his periods, and swell his phraseology; if an intimate famili­arity with the combinations of a dead language now and then betray him into too wide a deviation from the vernacular idiom; such a writer will have the mortification to see the beauties of his Style distorted by aukward imitation, and his errors (if in him they are errors) made ridiculous by ag­gravation. The language that, in his master hand, like a well-tuned instrument, ‘"discourses most eloquent musick,"’ under their management utters nothing but discord. The rattling of their periods and tumidity of their phrases, like the noise of a drum or swell of a bladder, are but symptoms of their wind and emptiness.

Ornament of diction, says Quintilian, tho' the greatest of beauties, is only graceful, when it follows as it were of itself, not when it is pursued. Of all ornaments, a foreign structure of period, as it is the most prejudicial to the genius of our language, [Page 182] appears the most studied and unnatural. An adopted word is but a partial and trifling innovation, and is often happily incorporated, when care is taken to naturalize the foreigner, by giving a na­tional air to the turn of the phrase. Every lan­guage, more especially the English, has its idioms, which we should not register, with Grammarians and Lexicographers, among its irregularities, but with Poets and Orators, number among its beauties. To extirpate idiom from our tongue, would be like rooting up the old oaks, that are the glory and ornament of our country; or, to vary the allusion, to square the language of our ancient writers to the rigid rules of Roman or even French Syntax, would extinguish the genius of our Tongue, and give the whole a foreign air, like the labours of a tasteless improver, exchanging the luxuriance of nature, in our gardens, for clipt yews, strait walks, and formal parterres.

Perspicuity without meanness is pronounced by Aristotle to be the perfection of language, or, as he more nervously expresses it, the virtue of Style; to attain which, he recommends, as a principal instrument, the use of the most common words and phrases in a figurative signification; the familiarity of the terms rendering them clear, and the novelty [Page 183] of their application giving them an air of elegance or dignity. The works of our old writers, pro­saick as well as poetical, abound with these home­spun metaphors, by which the lowest words in­crease their consequence, or at least, like cyphers, raise the value of their neighbours. Sometimes, indeed, these popular tropes are carried to excess, or used too licentiously; yet they commonly breathe a magnificent simplicity, and the whole construction is purely English; a circumstance, like that which induced Cicero to recommend the study of the an­cient Roman authors to his pupils in oratory, urging, that whoever was well read in their pro­ductions, could not, were he even inclined to it, speak other than genuine Latin.

It will not, I hope, be imagined from what I have said, that I think too lightly of the labours and genius of those learned philologists, who, by compiling Grammars and Dictionaries, have en­deavoured to give precision and stability to our Tongue. Their works, if properly consulted, are useful both to the learner and proficient; but if made the objects of their study, rather than occa­sional assistants, they will certainly be pernicious. The Grammars of living and dead languages are too often framed on different principles: in the [Page 184] latter, all irregularities, for which an authority can be pleaded, are sanctified by a rule; while the other brands every idiom, or bold combination, as a licentious barbarism. No man ever learnt a lan­guage, living or dead, from a Grammar or Dicti­onary; but by reading the best authors, and par­taking of the best conversation. He, who habi­tuates himself to such studies and such society, without proposing to himself a particular model, will insensibly form a Style of his own; as in the mechanical part of writing, every man abandoning himself to his own fancy or powers, almost every man writes a different hand. A certain freedom of Style, a manly flow of language, will distinguish the authors of such a school; whose periods will not be divided into formal compartments, like the squares of a Mosaick pavement, exactly answering each other; but the members of a sentence, like the members of the human body, will seem to be put together with ease as well as symmetry, and equally framed for the purposes of elegance and strength.

As to Grammars and Dictionaries, though not administering to the foundation of our tongue, they may certainly be of great use to contribute to its preservation. They are a kind of scaffold erected [Page 185] by skilful workmen, after our language has been completely built, to repair the ruins of time, and to keep the venerable structure from further decay. The last great English Dictionary will remain, as long as the English Tongue shall remain, a mo­nument of the learning and genius of its author; and I cannot better enforce the utility of the studies recommended in this paper, than by concluding it with an extract from the admirable Preface to that work; a Preface, which at once delivers the precepts, and affords the example, of a pure and eloquent Style.

THE GENTLEMAN. NUMBER IV.

THE GENTLEMAN. NUMBER V.

THOUGH I did not on the commencement of this undertaking engage to appear before the Publick at any certain stated periods, yet it might not unreasonably be presumed by the occa­sional reader, that I should at least adhere in some degree to the usual practice of an Occasional Writer. In the small circle of those, who did me the honour to peruse the foregoing numbers, my long silence has, I find, given rise to various conjectures. Some [Page 197] have not scrupled to pronounce me really & bonâ fide deceased; while others have contented them­selves with lamenting my metaphorical departure from the literary world, saying, that my small kilderkin of wit was entirely exhausted. Others again have asserted, that during the summer months, I was, like my betters, retired into the country. Many concurring in this opinion, have however attributed my silence to some accident attending my retirement or peregrinations. Some have repre­sented me on horseback, like the Taylor riding to Brentford, and have cruelly dislocated my collar­bone by a fall; some have shot me with a spring­gun, or stuck me in a man-trap, like Gulliver in a marrowbone; some have cast me away on an inland-navigation; and some have buried me alive in a cavern of the Peak.

I have now the pleasure to inform my friends that I am alive, and hope they will find me alive and merry. The truth is, I have been in the country; and though I cannot, like the inimitable Spectator, indulge myself in a series of rural lucubrations; though I cannot extract entertainment from the history of an henroost, or pen an agreeable disser­tation upon haycocks; yet before I meet the Par­liament in London, and set up my rest in town for [Page 198] the winter, I will give a short account of my first visit during the summer recess. This publication however is not without the privity and good liking of mine host. Let me not be blamed therefore for a breach of the laws of hospitality!

My old schoolfellow and college acquaintance, Sir Jocelyn Hearty, having long importuned me to pass two or three weeks with him in the country, about the beginning of August I set out for his seat, and towards the conclusion of the second day, found myself nearly at the end of my journey. Within two or three miles of the mansion-house, I encountered several horse-men whose seat appeared uncommonly loose and unsteady; some in small parties, hanging over their horses, and seeming in earnest conversation with each other; some galloping furiously after, dropping whips, and hats, and wigs, by the way, and shouting as they past, to denote their good fellowship, and hail their acquaintance. Upon turning into the grounds, which lead directly to the house, my ears were sa­luted with a loud vocal chorus, which however quickly subsided, but was almost as quickly re­newed, and thus rose and fell by turns, till I was arrived at the gate. Entering the hall, I found it strewed with honest rusticks, fast asleep, in their [Page 199] boots and great coats. A saloon on each side of the hall was filled with benches and long ta­bles, at which a jovial company still kept their places, drinking, toasting, and singing.

My friend, it seems, was already retired. An old servant, however, took me under his protection, and provided me with every necessary accommo­dation till the next morning. About noon I was introduced to Sir Jocelyn, whom I found in his dressing-room, with a bowl before him, containing a composition of milk, nutmeg, and brandy, which he called a Doctor. This Doctor is, it seems, always called in on the morrow of these joyous fes­tivities, and though not regular, may boast as numerous a set of patients, and a practice as ex­tensive, as any of the Faculty. After a hearty shake by the hand, and a few other civilities, the Baronet informed me, that he and his friends of yesterday had been getting drunk according to act of parliament. Having formerly been a student of the law, I expressed some surprise at not being able to recollect so particular a chapter in the statute book. ‘"It is one of the best of them all, for all that, said Sir Jocelyn: and yet it is but a new law neither, and I had the honour to assist at the passing it. The Grenville Bill, my friend! [Page 200] Since that Bill past into a law, we dare not give a gill of wine, or a tiff of punch, before the election; but it is fit we should entertain our friends handsomely some time after it is over, that the freeholders may see we do not forget them, and remember us hereafter accordingly."’ I could not help smiling at so ingenious an exposi­tion of the statute, telling my friend that the soundness of his law put me in mind of Foigard's logick, ‘"if you receive it before-hand it is a bribe; but if you take it afterwards, is is only a grati­fication."’

A few days after, Sir Jocelyn told me, if it was a matter of indifference to me which way I might ride that morning, he should be very glad of my company to a village at about eight miles distance. ‘"But I must quit you at the town's end, says he, for I am engaged to dinner, and on particular business. We have a Meeting of the Justices."’ The chief business of this meeting, it seems, was to sign Licences for the Publick Houses for the year ensuing. This business was fortunately dis­patched before dinner; fortunately, I say, be­cause their Worships shewed themselves so sincerely well inclined to promote the interest of those, whose callings they met to authorise, that it [Page 201] would not have been prudent to postpone an opera­tion for which their very zeal might disqualify them. In short, after a joyous day, Sir Jocelyn rode home rather quicker than he went, and we saw no more of him till the next morning.

In about a week more however he was again called forth to a Turnpike Meeting. Sir Jocelyn, ever ready to accommodate his friends, and serve the Publick, duly attended; but the road under consideration proved so execrable, and so many difficulties occurred concerning the proposals for repairing it, that the Committee sat till midnight, and did not rise till they had debated the matter, like the antient Germans, both drunk and sober.

The Races and the Assizes, being each a kind of assembly of the whole county, it was impossible for the Baronet and his family to be absent from either. On two different days of the Races were entered two horses belonging to Sir Jocelyn. Both started, but their fortune was as various as their colours. The first day, his bald-faced grey horse, North, won the odds against the field, carried off the King's Plate, and was victorious; but on the second day his brown horse, Orator, took rust, ran out of the course, and was distanced. Sir Jocelyn and his friends, after the example of the Ancients, celebrated [Page 202] one of these events, and lamented the other, exactly in the same manner. The flowing bowls were crowned again and again in honour of the winner, and the cup of affliction ran over in sorrow for the loser.

At the Assizes, Sir Jocelyn was Foreman of the Grand Jury. So many bills were presented, that the several members of the Inquest, exhausted by their uncommon fatigue, required a more than or­dinary recruit. It is no wonder therefore that, having duly dispatched in sober sadness the business of the nation, the honest country gentlemen relaxed their gravity, and converting their solemn assembly to a merry meeting, protracted their sitting after supper till daylight.

An old boon companion of my acquaintance used to say, that getting tipsy was one of the pleasantest things in the world, but that nothing was so irksome and painful than its necessary consequence, getting sober again. This was exactly the case with Sir Jocelyn. The text of every evening was mirth and jollity, but the comment of the mor­row-morning was sorrow and sickness. The hunting season commenced some little time before I departed. Every hare or fox that had been killed in the morning, was revived at night, and again [Page 203] run down in full cry. The exercise of the chase was less laborious than the festivity of the evening. Politicks took their turn also. America was floated with lakes of claret, and the blockade of Boston caused many an head-ach. On one of these oc­casions, seeing my worthy friend in much pain, I could not refrain from a short and affectionate ex­postulation, regretting that an excellent under­standing should be drowned in liquor, and the best of men rendered a martyr to his own hospi­tality and benevolence. ‘"Ah, my dear friend, said Sir Jocelyn, with his hand pressed upon his temples, you Town Gentlemen imagine that we lead very quiet, idle, lives in the Country: but take my word for it, that it requires a very good estate, and a very good constitution, to support, as one ought to do, the character of a Country Gentleman."’

THE GENTLEMAN. NUMBER VI.

TERRAE-FILIUS. NUMBER I.

TO all whom it may concern, I the great TERRAE-FILIUS, the redoubted Acade­mical Satyrist, the terror of old and young, male and female, graduates and undergraduates, gowns­men and townsmen, matriculated and unmatri­culated, send greeting. I am come, Ladies and [Page 218] Gentlemen, according to ancient custom, to be one of the principal Actors in the Celebrities of the present Term. You have heard, without doubt, of the noble exploits of my predecessors, those bold assertors of the Freedom of Speech, and the Li­berty of the Press. Though the degeneracy of the times, and the numberless innovations in the ancient customs and usages of the University will not permit me, after the manner of my ancestors, to enter the Theatre, and pour forth the torrent of my Family Eloquence from the Rostrum, yet I am resolved, not to be put to silence. My wisdom shall cry aloud in the streets, though no man re­gardeth it. I will erect my temporary Stage, like the itinerant practitioners in physick, in the high­way; I will make a speech without doors. If I am forbid to mount the regular Pulpit, I do not doubt of having as numerous followers as other Field-Preachers. I am determined, at all events, to maintain the Honour, and assert the Privileges of my family; and make no doubt of being able to prove myself a Chip of the Old Block.

The method I have taken of announcing my intentions, by Advertisements in the London Papers, and Oxford Journal has, I find, created the utmost consternation among all ranks and [Page 219] degrees of people in this famous Town and University. The Mayor and Corporation, I am informed were first seised with the pannick fit, and held a council extraordinary on this occasion; when it was taken into consideration, whether they should put me into the Stocks, send me to the House of Correction, or bind me over to appear at the next Quarter Sessions. At length how­ever it was held to be an University-Business, and to fall more properly under the cognisance of the House of Convocation. From the Body Corporate therefore my cause was removed, by a new kind of Certiorari, to the Body Academical. The Right Honourable the Chancellor, I am told, is alarmed, and thinks of issuing a formal prohibition. The Learned and Reverend the Vice-Chancellor, I hear, has declared that he will not grant his Imprimatur to my Works: and the wise heads in Golgotha have laid their Sculls together about me and my paper. That formidable lawyer, and learned gentleman, the VENERIAN Professor, it is confi­dently asserted, is consulting the Archives, to pre­pare a SOLEMN LECTURE on the two tremendous Statutes De Contumeliis Compescendis, and De Famosis Libellis. The Publick Orator, they say, is drawing up an Harangue in the style and spirit of Quousque [Page 220] tandem? and the Poetry Professor is writing a Poem against me. It is further added, that the name of TERRAE-FILIUS himself, as soon as it is certainly known, will be registered in the BLACK BOOK; and he himself, like most of his fore-fathers, will be publickly expelled:—That his poor printer will be trained after a Beadle, as big as Pope Beaver, into the Vice-Chancellor's Court, and in spite of the Statute De Privilegiis Urbis et Univer­sitatis simul non fruendis, have the honour of an Academical Mittimus to the Castle or Bocardo.

Some few, however, who fancy that they see deeper than the surface, and that they have more penetration than their neighbours, affect to know me and my intentions better. The dreadful sound of the name I have assumed, which has alarmed the vulgar, as that of Raw-head-and-bloody-bones serves as a bug-bear for children, these confident gen­tlemen affect to consider as a mere scare-crow set up to fright the few shallow daws and chattering pies of the University, while my words, however big and sonorous, are as innocent as the noise of a cherry-clapper. They affect to laugh at those who have conceived horrible ideas of me, and cry out, when they hear that TERRAE-FILIUS is coming, that there is a lion in the way. TERRAE-FILIUS, [Page 221] they pretend, is not that tremendous animal he was wont to be. Lion as he is, he has filed his teeth, and pared his claws, and though he may venture to lift up his voice, and make the wide forest tremble at his roar, yet like Shakespear's Lion, he will roar as gently as any nightingale.

Be this as it may, whether I shall prove myself a Literary Hornet, a downright Academical Wasp, or merely an innocent Humble-bee, with a small sting by way of defence, or melius non tangere, in my tail; whether my style will be more agreeable to the genius of our modern ENCAENIA, or the old Saturnalia; whether I shall pour forth from my small cruet of wit and humour the oil of Panegyrick, or the vinegar of Invective and Satire; in what­ever manner I may write or speak; still, Gentle­men, I must insist on it, that I have a natural, an uncontrovertible right to appear at these Solemnities, a right established by the ancient forms of the University, and recognised by the Statutes. The celebrities appendant and appurtenant to the Act-Term, every man must acknowledge, would be imperfect without the admission of such a character as that I have undertaken to sustain; a character as necessary to enliven the gravity of solemn convo­cations, formal processions, long harangues, dull [Page 222] disputations, and oratorios most musical, most me­lancholy, as the introduction of the Fool among the personages of the Old Comedy, or that merry gentleman Master Punch among the wooden Kings and Queens at a Puppet-Shew. It is the peculiar nature also of seasons of festivity, to strike out sallies of Wit, and indulge strokes of Satire, which give no more annoyance to the ge­neral merriment, than illuminations and fireworks on a night of rejoicing, though perhaps some queer old gentleman may be alarmed at the crackers bouncing about his ears, the serpents hissing at his tail, or a squib whizzing in his periwig.

In an age less productive of innovations than the present, I should indeed be surprized that when the Celebration of the Peace has cccasioned a kind of Publick Act, no person, properly qualified should be called upon by the Heads of the University to officiate in the capacity of TERRAE-FILIUS in the Theatre; or at least if so essential a Personage as TERRAE-FILIUS should be by our Academical Licensers and Chamberlains silenced and forbid to appear on the scene, I am still more surprized that the character of Publick Orator also should not be wiped out of the Dramatis Personae. His rattling Eloquence and my Sprightliness, (or, if you please [Page 223] to call it so, Impertinence) should accompany one another as naturally as thunder and lightning. To have all praise and no satire, all sweet and no sour, is to make your punch without lemon. The province of Publick Orator, we know by experience, is wholly Panegyrick; that is (the case of the present company always excepted) to say every thing of a man but the truth; whereas the very nature and spirit of my office demands, that al­though the truth should not be told at all times, yet at this particular season, I may tell the truth, the whole truth, and sometimes perhaps, a little more than the truth; and though truth in general is well known to be at the bottom of the well, yet on these occasions, it may be pumped up, be the springs ever so foul and muddy, till it runs clear, and dealt out among you by pails and buckets full.

The Reverend Dr. BROWN, a worthy member and Illustrious ornament of a Sister University, in a dissertation lately published, wherein he has drawn all the rudiments of politeness from savages, and shewn us that the Tree of Knowledge ori­ginally took root in the soil of ignorance; the learned Doctor, I say, Gentlemen, has proved almost to a logical, if not a mathematical demon­stration, that Satire and Comedy, as well as Ode and Tragedy, owe their birth to the solemnization [Page 224] of that elegant Indian celebrity, the savage Song-Feast, where every man had a licence to make free with another, and to throw out jests and gibes upon his neighbour. Since therefore the Publick Orator ad­heres to his imitation of the great Prototypes of sublime Panegyrick, shall not TERRAE-FILIUS be permitted to follow up the Originals of familiar Sarcasm? Shall we, Ladies and Gentlemen, be less liberal and open-hearted in our mirth than the Cherokees and the Catabaws? Shall we be ex­ceeded in politeness by the Six Nations? And shall the savages on the Ohio and Missisippi indulge themselves in more truly-classical festivities, or ele­gant railleries, than the polite scholars on the banks of the Isis?

If we descend to later times, or examine the custom of more polished ages, we shall find that at all seasons of festivity and rejoicing, peculiar freedoms are allowed; nay that even some mixture of terror is often introduced, in order, as may be supposed, to give a higher relish to the other portions of the Celebrity. The Spanish bull-feasts, and old English tilts and tournaments are of this nature; or to confine my illustrations entirely within the limits of our own times and nation, and to shew we love a little horse-radish with our roast-beef, what do you think, Gentlemen and Ladies, [Page 225] of the Champion at a Coronation? Is not a doughty knight, armed cap-a-pee, prancing in upon a milk white palfrey, by found of trumpet and beat of drum, and throwing his gauntlet in defiance, a most tremendous apparition? He makes his entrance too during the peaceful ceremonial of Dinner-time, yet I never heard that he frightened away the stomach of the most delicate Lord or Lady, or infused terror into any of the worshipful Aldermen.—Do not let TERRAE-FILIUS disturb your Gaudies, Gentlemen!

Suffer me, then, Ladies and Gentlemen, in like manner, at this season of general festivity, armed at all points, with all the accoutrements of the Old TERRAE-FILIUS, and mounted on a high-bred Pegasus, to make my usual cavalcade among you. You, who have shewn yourselves willing to afford general encouragement, who have committed your eyes to the care of Chevalier TAYLOR, and your tongues to Professor SHERIDAN; you, who have given a hospitable reception to Drybutter on the Glasses, and Maddox on the Wire; you, who have welcomed the arrival of the Fire-Eater, and the Giant, and the Dwarf, and the Hermaphrodite; you, who have with infinite propriety circulated papers, proposing to honour that accomplished [Page 226] Master of Legerdemain, Highman Palatine, the HIGH-GERMAN ARTIST, with the degree of MASTER of ARTS; receive your old acquaintance TERRAE-FILIUS! invest him with all the dignities, privileges, and immunities of his Office; let the javelin-men in rusty green, and the two cracked trumpets precede him, as they do the Judges of Assize, and let none but acknowledged felons and fore-doomed convicts be afraid of the consequences of our opening our Commission of Oyer and Ter­miner.

Let such delinquents however, and such it seems there are, let such I say, tremble! My arm is raised, the scourge is in my hand, and conscience (which, according to Swift, is a pair of breeches) lays them bare before me. Let all, to whom the lines which stand at the head of this paper, are any way applicable, prepare to be arraigned for their crimes and misdemeanors, and receive sentence foro conscientiae accordingly. I will not now transcribe a translation of my Motto from Francis or Creech, or after the new-fangled fashion of modern wits, give a new one of my own, adapted to modern manners; ^* but I rather chuse to enforce and illustrate [Page 227] the alarming words of the Roman Satirist, by the following still more tremendous Quotation from Shakespeare.

The regular dispatch of business, and the solemn administration of justice must however, be deferred till to-morrow. To-day the edge of our Satire, like the ax before the condemnation of a State-Prisoner, shall be turned away from the criminal. In the mean while, for the next twenty-four hours, let the University be at rest! let the tea-giving Belles of this town, who have danglers in square caps and hanging sleeves, who boast the triumphs of a letter'd heart, not put the pit-a-pat-ation of their dear little bosoms into a flutter! Let the rosy Doctors and my good Masters in every Common-Room sleep in peace, till their next neighbour informs them that the bottle is at their elbow! Let them smoke their pipes in security! Let [Page 228] not pale faces turn red, nor red faces turn pale! To-day (such is my respect for the Anniversary of the Commemoration) I will not disturb even the tranquillity of a Pot-house! Let the young Smarts, and Bucks, and Bloods of the University lay aside their apprehensions for to-day! I will not discompose their dress by remarking on an unstatutable Waistcoat or the want of a Band, or attempt to put their Hair out of Kidney. I will not, like an unmannerly Dean or Censor of a College, break in upon them to interrupt the evening's amusement of Cards or Dice, the brisk circulation of Toasts, or the merry merry round of Catches at their rooms; nor attempt to take them, like the Proctor, over a late bottle at the Coffee-house. I will not, like another GREAT TOM, toll them into College with a hundred sober hum-drum Mementoes, that it is past nine o'Clock; nor will I lay open the mysteries of their Scenes of Merriment in London, Woodstock, and Lady-grove: and if I fine them for their irregula­rities, it shall be in a much more moderate sum than Forty Shillings, or any other Sconce imposed by the Proctors. The Price of my Papers, Gen­tlemen, is no more than Sixpence apiece.

TERRAE-FILIUS. NUMBER II.

OF all the Literary Commodities, which are at present brought to market, there is not one which produces half so large a demand, or such a quick sale as SCANDAL. Formerly the sweet flowers of Poetry, like Myrtle or Orange Trees in Pots, were the chief ornaments of a Bookseller's Window, and sold as well as Roses and Hyacinths at Covent-Garden; but now every bud and blossom of Helicon, every fruit and flower of Poetry, every shrub of Parnassus is an unprofitable weed, unless [Page 231] it be as bitter as Wormwood, or Coloquintida. Heavy Treatises, Moral Discourses, and dull Dissertations, were once as greatly in request as beef at Leaden-hall; and Religion and Philosophy were as fixt staple commodities as corn at Bear-Key. Law, in white Calf-skin, while there were any Students in the profession, sold at as high rates in the purlieus of the Temple or Lincoln's Inn, as the Calf itself in Smithfield; and till the poring over musty Parchments was exploded in the Inns of Court, the Sheep-skin was almost as valuable as the Sheep. It was easy also for the Manufacturers of Systems and Paradoxes to drive a kind of con­traband trade in Deism, Infidelity, and such other Hardware; and little Dablers in Ink often made successful cruises in smuggling Prophaneness and Bawdry. In a word, every common Pedlar in a Magazine was thought to have some curious Trinket in his Pack; and the lowest Hawker was sure to make a dinner on a Bloody Murder, or the King's Speech.

These times, wherein the great Mart of Letters was in such a flourishing situation, were indeed glorious! but now, to the unspeakable detriment of Trading Authors of almost every denomination, Literary Property is reduced to a very narrow [Page 232] compass; and the richest Copyholders not only groan under the load of heavy Fines and new Impo­sitions, but see their most valuable Possessions perishing under their hands, or in spite of every fence of Law and Equity, invaded by bold tres­passers from Scotland. For many parcels and whole bales of goods they have now no vent. No performance can promise itself a great run that is not highly seasoned with Abuse; and the nearer a Writer approaches to unquestionable Libel, and the most open Scandalum Magnatûm, the more his Work will be read. If a smart piece of Satire is thought to have occasioned a duel, though it is doubtful whether the pistols of the combatants ever were more than upon half-cock, the paper will run off like wild-fire. An information in the King's-Bench, or a visit from a King's Messenger will carry off a dozen impressions; and if the Author stands in the Pillory, or is committed to Newgate, or sent to the Tower, the fortune of the Bookseller is made for ever.

It is plain therefore, Ladies and Gentlemen, from these and many other considerations, which I have duly weighed and deliberated, that SCANDAL is the most profitable commodity which a Writer can deal in, being that to which Readers give [Page 233] the most encouragement. Scandal-mongers, like Fish-mongers, may put what price they please on their goods, and be sure to have them all bought off their hands, provided they will take care to supply their customers fresh and fresh. This therefore is to give Notice, that I, TERRAE-FILIUS, at the University-Scandal-Office in Oxford, have determined to open a shop in the High-Street, during the ENCAENIA; and though all will be accounted fish that comes to my net, yet to avoid creating a glut, which might make my stock too cheap, I shall, like the rest of my honest fraternity, throw away the small Fry, and offer you nothing but the very Prime of the Market; and I can assure you, Ladies and Gentlemen, that I have se­veral odd Fish, and such as were never exhibited to sale before, which are just brought to town BY LAND CARRIAGE.

I have already received, in consequence of my late request by publick advertisement, several very curious and entertaining anecdotes concerning some of the most eminent Personages attending the present Celebrity, aliens and visiters, as well as inhabitants and members of Colleges, with many of which, the names of the parties printed at full length, I propose to oblige my Readers; [Page 234] reserving the rest to enrich the two Volumes of my College Atalantis, Subscriptions to which pour in a-pace, abundantly more than sufficient to defray the expence of any Prosecutions which my Papers may incur, or to carry on such actions as I may think necessary to maintain, in vindication of the Freedom of the Subject, and the Liberty of the Press.

But while I am thus employed in collecting materials for Secret History, and pushing as far as possible my researches into the characters of others, you, I find, Ladies and Gentlemen, are equally assiduous in your enquiries after Me. It is a well known remark of Addison, that Readers never entertain a true relish for a Performance, till they know something of the Author; as whether he is a fair man, or a black man; a short, man, or a tall man; a nobleman, or a gentleman, or a tradesman, or a highwayman; a divine, a lawyer, or a physician; high or low; rich or poor: sorry am I to be obliged to call in question the observation of so fine a writer, but I must beg leave to insist on it, that till the Book is, by some means or other,—by its Whimsicalness, its Scurrility, or no matter what—become the object of general notice, nobody cares a farthing [Page 235] about the Writer. Then, indeed, when the alarm is given, when Merit has made its way, or when Fashion or Caprice have given the nod of approbation, then the Hue and Cry goes abroad after the Author.—Who is he? which is he? where is he? what says he?—This is, and I'll be judged by Mr. Shandy,—this is, as the Laureat terms it, the Honeymoon of Wit.—Now Lords ask him to dinner; Ladies take him to Ranelagh; and Ma­nagers give him the Freedom of the Theatre. His Name is in every News-paper, and his Face in every Print-shop. If the real Author is not known, a substitute, as in the case of Militia-Men, is appointed to serve in his stead, which the world runs after with as much eagerness, as Turnus pursues the airy image of Aeneas, or ra­ther as the Booksellers pursue the phantom of an Author in the Dunciad.

I had once some thoughts, in order to gratify the reigning passion for Caricature, of having my head cut in wood, and placed at the front of these papers. At another time I had half formed a re­solution of having my face painted by Haggarty, and hung up as a sign, at the door of my Printer. But finding that masked Balls are coming into fashion, I at last determined to mix among the [Page 236] croud in disguise, with the liberty of other Masqueraders, of attacking every person in com­pany, in a seigned voice, with the, witty Interro­gation of Do you know me?

Curiosity, however, is not to be repreft, and there are many that will flatter themselves they see through the disguise. They know your walk, your voice, your air, or some little peculiarity in your manner, or deportment. I have had the honour of being mistaken for several celebrated persons already, and every man is convinced that I am one of his old acquaintance. Some take me for that merry fellow, the facetious Author of The Companion to the Guide, and the Guide to the Companion; that lively spark who shewed early dawnings of a Poetical Genius, and soon proved himself a fine chopping boy, that would do honour to his ALMA MATER, when he sung the Triumphs of Isis: who not only brings up the rear of Epicaedia and Gratulationes with uncommon spirit, but can also descend from the sublimer exercises of his Muse, to celebrate the Maker of Mutton-Pies, or compose Odes on Grizzle-Wigs: who, though now a grave Tutor, cannot surely, nay should not, wholly forget his days of pupilage; and though now

yet he must remember the days when his ALE first became a rival to Phillips's CYDER; the days when he frequented Christ-Church, and spent his evening at Captain Jolly's.

Some there are, who suppose me to be no other than that grave Antiquarian, that SOUL of AIL SOULS, who obliged the world some years ago with a dissertation on the MALLARD; who has since appeared in the shape of a Decypherer, and wrote an Explanation of the. OXFORD ALMANACK; and about the same time, like an expert Gamester, played my cards most notably at a certain Game of ALL FOURS.

Others take me for that Rattle the STUDENT; and others for that Dapperwit the GENIUS; and some for both these together who have come down expresly from London, like the chairmen with their sedans; or like a pair of oars on the Thames in Whitson-Holydays, have agreed to ply together, during the present Celebrity on the Isis. Should it be the first of these wags, it is [Page 238] pretended that the company may expect a Sign Post Exhibition, or that the solemn Oratorios under the direction of Dr. Hayes, the Professor of Musick will be turned into ridicule by a grand Burlesque Ode, and a masked Band from Ranelagh: and in case it should be the other Little Wit, it is supposed that, besides threatning the University with a TERRAE-FILIUS, he means once more to convert the Tennis-Court into a Playhouse, and, in defiance of the Statute De ludis prohi­bitis, to bring down a company of Comedians (fu­nambulos et histriones) to present us with new JEALOUS WIVES, and new POLLY HONEYCOMBES, of his own composition.

Some few, who indulge this last way of thinking, are half inclined to suppose that TERRAE FILIUS is the Haymarket MOMUS, who formerly gave Tea, and took off his Tutor and the rest of the Fellows at Worcester-College; in which honourable So­ciety he is acknowledged to be a Founder's Kin, of which circumstance perhaps he may one day or other claim the benefit, notwithstanding the objections raised in Dr. Blackstone's learned Treatise on Collateral Consanguinity.

Others again, the ministerial and anti-minis­terial Characters in the University, whose ideas [Page 239] of Wit and Humour are almost entirely absorbed in Port and Politicks, will have it that I am one or other of the supposed Authors of the North-Briton; since it is generally reported that the Reverend Gentleman, having snapped the last cord of poor Hogarth's heart-strings, will come down in his laced hat, like General Churchill, Or Tiddy-Doll, and being a member of the Uni­versity of Cambridge, it is taken for granted that the Convocation will take this publick oppor­tunity of admitting him ad eundem. At the same time too the News-papers having already in­formed us that the Member of Parliament for Aylesbury will be here in his way to Stowe, the Squire is hourly expected with a grand retinue of Compositors, Pressmen, Devils, and his own extempore travelling Press from Great George Street, Westminster.

Such, it seems, and so various, are the sen­timents of different little cabals in this Town and University, concerning the real Person of TERRAE-FILIUS. Whether he be either, or nei­ther, or one, or all of the characters above­mentioned, time alone must discover. He is de­termined, like the Actors among the Antients, to play out his little Comedy in a Mask, and [Page 240] all the notification which he thinks proper to give of himself in his present Bills, is, that at the particular desire of several Persons of Quality, the part of TERRAE-FILIUS is attempted by a GENTLEMAN FOR HIS OWN DIVERSION, being the first time of his appearing in that character.

TERRAE-FILIUS. NUMBER III.

THE reigning passion of this nation, for some few years past, seems to have been the love of Shews, and Spectacles, and Festivals, and Solemnities. During the war, the people betrayed several symp­toms of this rage after fine sights, and many thou­sands followed the Camp, as young ensigns often take to the army, for the sake of its splendor and gaiety. One week all the vehicles in England and from the coach and six, or landau with two postilions, down to the one horse chaise, and sober [Page 243] sulky, were whirling passengers along the road from all quarters towards Portsmouth, to see the Fleet assembled at Spithead; and the next, the same people were transported with the same rapi­dity, by the same passion for a sight and a croud, to behold the evolutions and manoeuvres of the re­giments of Militia embodied and encamped at Winchester. At the Coronation the tide of company from every county in the kingdom flowed, like rivers discharging themselves into the sea, into the metropolis. Last summer one would have imagined that all the famous witches of Lancashire had been at work to draw the whole city of London from its foundations, which seemed, like Birnam wood going to Dunsinane, to be all moving together to Preston Guild. This summer, now that Oxford is become the scene wherein the Grand Shew is exhibited, and the doors of the Sheldonian Theatre are thrown open for almost a whole week, it is no wonder that London once more empties itself into this magnificent reservoir, and that all ranks and degrees of people are assembled to see the doctors in scarlet, and to attend the Lectures of TERRAE-FILIUS.

There is not a man on earth, Ladies and Gen­tlemen, who is a truer lover of mirth and jollity [Page 244] than myself; and I take a most particular delight in the present ENCAENIA. It gives me an un­speakable pleasure to see the new Dunstable-bonnets mixt with square caps, and a gown and petticoat by the side of a gown and cassock. I could stand whole hours to see the white fustian riding-habits and blue sattin-waistcoats make their entry at East-Gate; and am transported to see the boot and the basket of all the stage-coaches filled with rosin and cat-gut, and fiddles, and hautboys, and cla­rionets, and french-horns, and bass-viols, while the inside and outside of every machine is crouded with the performers, English and Italian, vocal and instrumental. Festivals and Solemnities have, I grant, their uses and advantages; and far be it from me to attempt to erase any of the red-letter days from the OXFORD Almanack! It must however, at the same time be confessed, that scenes of grandeur, and seasons of celebrity, which serve merely for relaxation to the studious, and fill the intelligent mind with great ideas, often prove only new occasions of idleness to the holy-day-making tradesmen, and open nothing but the mouth of the ignorant, who stand agape, gazing with a foolish face of pleasure and astonishment. I am not one who lament as a disappointment our not having [Page 245] fireworks on occasion of the present Peace; and think that the 40,000 people, assembled last week in Hyde-park, had sufficient consolation in the review. I am glad indeed to see our CHANCELLOR pre­siding in person, for the first time, at a publick Solemnity among us, yet do I not wish for the in­stallation of another to produce more spectacles, though as magnificent as what we saw at the installation of Lord WESTMORLAND: and for the above reasons, as well as for some others which I do not think it prudent or advisable to mention at present, I hope it will be long, very long, before there is another Coronation!

Going along the High-street last Tuesday morning I was observing, not without a smile, one of those modern tottering crazy vehicles, half-post-chaise, half-chariot, neither one nor the other, and yet something of both, driving towards the Angel Inn-yard; but turning my eyes from the carriage to the persons it contained, whom should I see, but my good friend Mr. FOLIO the book­seller, near St. Paul's, and his wife, Mrs. FOLIO; who at that very instant happening to dart the rays of her bright eyes in right angles upon me, she pulled my Friend FOLIO by the sleeve, who seemed half a-sleep by her side. FOLIO no sooner [Page 246] saw me, than he ran his head and neck a yard and a half out of the chariot window, and bawled out lustily Mr. — but hold, I must not tell my name. I followed the chariot into the Inn-yard, and had the honour of handing out Mrs. FOLIO.

The first ceremonies occasioned by this our un­expected interview being over, and being quietly seated in the parlour, Mr. FOLIO informed me, that having a new edition of a Jest-Book printing at a private press in Oxford, he took this oppor­tunity of visiting the University, and giving Mrs. FOLIO an agreeable airing; after which he enquired very cordially after Mr. Fletcher of the Turle, Mr. Daniel Prince, and the rest of his brother Booksellers in Oxford. I find too, continued he, you have a TERRAE-FILIUS,—a new paper I sup­pose,—pray who is the Author? Does it make a noise? Does it sell? How many do they print? Would you be so kind now, my dear Sir, (taking me by the hand and smiling) as to assist me in making proper extracts, and furnish me with a few occasional paragraphs to send up to the Ledger, and Lloyd's Evening Post? To these various in­terrogations I made no other reply, than enquiring after the younger part of the family,—I hope Miss FOLIO is well, Ma'am,—Very well Sir, I [Page 247] thank you, said Mrs. Folio; we had some thoughts of bringing her down with us, but my spouse had such a quantity of things to put into the chariot, that we could not easily croud three on us into it: so I have left Polly in our lodgings at Islington Spa, and there, you know, she can't be unked for want of company,—and if she pleases, she may go to the Wells every night.—And how does young Mr. FOLIO do?—What! Bonus! says Mr. FOLIO, Bonus is entered in one of the col­leges—He has left St. Paul's School, and is a brother gownsman of your's; at which words he rung the bell, and on the appearance of the waiter, dispatched him to — College for young Master FOLIO, desiring his company with some particular Friends at the Angel.

Till the return of the Messenger Mr. FOLIO, after having dispatched another waiter to the barber's with his wig, amused himself with unpacking some parcels and valizes, which, it seems, were what had filled up Miss FOLIO's place in the chariot. The first he unfolded, he informed me were some sheets of a new work of his own writing, which he proposed to publish early in the ensuing winter. He prest me very hard to read some particular passages, which I evaded, pleading want of time [Page 248] and leisure to give it due attention in the present hurry and dissipation of the place.—Come, come, says he, I know you Gentlemen that write don't approve of us in the trade pretending to publish books of our own—but we have some good hands among us, I can tell you.—Oh, I know that.—Know it! Ay, but you none of you care to own it. For any thing, courtly and airy, for a Dra­matick Satire, or a modern Tragedy, we have Dodsley in Pall-Mall,—Mr. Pope allowed him to be a good Poet—for Divinity and Morality we have Payne that lives in the Row—for Criticism, or any thing in the Belles Lettres way, there is R. Griffiths,—why he writes half the Monthly Review—and then for the whole Circle of Sciences there's our old Friend Mr. Newbery, at the North Door of St. Paul's—and the Author of a late Pamphlet, called The Lives of the present Writers, assures us for a fact that he has wrote two fa­vourite farces.

How much farther his zeal for the honour of the Trade would have carried him is uncertain, if his vehemence had not been broke in upon by the return of the messenger, and the arrival of Young FOLIO. The mother was charmed beyond expression with his appearance in the Academical [Page 249] Habit, and vowed he was grown half a head, or else that dress made him look so much taller. Well, I protest it becomes him vastly? Don't it? (turning to me) you must know, Sir, his father intends making on him a Clergyman.—Ay, ay, the gown by all means! said Folio—But come, Bonus! you must shew your mother and me the University—Mr. — I hope will favour us with his company to make the tower of the Colleges, and return afterwards to eat a bit of mutton with us at dinner. I accepted the invi­tation, and Mr. FOLIO having waited in his gold laced hat with a handkerchief of Mrs. FOLIO's about his ears, till the return of his wig, properly bushed out and powdered, and having in the interim equipped himself with a full suit of pom­padour with gold buttons, which he had brought down carefully packed between pasteboards, we sallied out of the Angel into the High-Street to see the University.

We were no sooner got into the street, than we were carried by a kind of instinct into Mr. Parker's, not only to give Mr. FOLIO an oppor­tunity of shaking his old friend by the hand, but also in order to furnish himself with one of Mr. Prince's Pocket Companions, without which [Page 250] he declared it was impossible to go round the Uni­versity. There, Sir, continued he applying himself to me, there's another instance of a Genius in a Bookseller. The Pocket Companion is all Mr. PRINCE's own,—not only his own property, but his own writing. One of your gownsmen, indeed, has since wrote a New Guide,—but it won't do,—shaking his head,—it won't do,—much inferior to my Friend Daniel's.

We then crossed the way to Queen's College, where Bonus, as FOLIO called him, informed us, that the East side of the square had been lately rebuilt, and that there had been some squabbles among the Fellows. FOLIO said the Chapel was fine, very fine, and quoted two lines out of Milton's Spenseroso, for so he termed it, about a dim religious Light. As to Mrs. FOLIO, she declared that nothing in the College pleased her so much, as the figure over the door of her Majesty in a Cage.—But that she said was very pretty, and she liked it vastly.

We then proceeded to ALL SOULS, and the RADCLIFF LIBRARY, at the first of which places Bonus informed us, that the Common Room there was remarkable for the best port in Oxford. Some of the fellows, says he, have tost off four [Page 251] bottles of it a day, for several years together, without doing them any manner of harm. FOLIO observed, that neither the College Library, nor the Radcliff, were as yet half sufficiently stocked, and it would be a rare job to have the furnishing them with books. Mrs. FOLIO said, that the Radcliff was a good deal like St. Paul's, only not half so large or so handsome. A queer sort of building, Ma'am, said young Bonus,—a mere pepper-box,—and there,—(pointing to the turrets of All Souls) there are the sugar-casters.—This produced an universal laugh, which concluded with an ex­clamation of FOLIO's,—Well said, Bonus! egad, I don't think that would be amiss in the new edition of the Jokes.

We then entered the Schools' Quadrangle, where Mr. FOLIO took upon himself to inform his wife that all the rudiments of learning were taught in that spot. Here, says he, my dear, (pointing) there are Lectures read every morning,—Here the Stu­dents attend the Professor of Divinity,—and here they attend the History Professor,—and here the Poetry Professor,—and here the Professor of Phy­sick,—and here the Professor of Civil Law,—and so on,—all learned men that have large salaries on purpose to lecture their pupils in the [Page 252] sciences.—Ay, says Mrs. FOLIO, it is no won­der that they have all so much Larning.—It is impossible to recount half their observations on the Picture-Gallery, the Bodleian Library, the Arun­del Marbles, the Pomfret Collection, the Cla­rendon Printing House, the Theatre, and the Mu­seum. I can only recollect, that Mr. FOLIO met with an acquaintance among the compositors at the printing-house, with whom he entered into con­versation about the method of printing Baskerville's Bible without wetting the sheets before they were put to press;—and that he supposed a good deal of money might be made of the M.S.S. in the Bodley;—that he compared the Museum to Don Saltero's Coffee-house, and that Mrs. FOLIO at going out asked the person who shew'd the room, If there was no wax-work.—In the rest of our circuit I remember nothing remarkable, except that Mrs. FOLIO was extremely delighted with the Bason and Mercury in the center of the great quadrangle at Christ-church, and told her husband she wished they had just such a one in the middle of their garden at Islington.

We then returned to the angel, and as soon as dinner was ended, and the cloth taken away, Well, Bonus, says FOLIO, and what hast thou learnt [Page 253] here? Tell us some of thy studies,—come give your mother and me a little touch of the Ma­thematicks.— Bonus, being hard pressed, was obliged to comply; and drawing a kind of figure with his finger in the wine that was spilt on the table, uttered very gravely some incoherent jargon about A and B being equal to C and D, and pa­rallel lines, and equilateral triangles. FOLIO and his wife observed him with infinite attention, and the most visible delight; and as soon as he had done, This, says FOLIO,—this my dear, (addressing himself to his wife) is what we call Demonstration. Sir, says Bonus, I did not think you had so good a notion of the Mathematicks.—Child, says Mrs. FOLIO, your father has a general knowledge of every thing.

Not long after I took my leave, and could not help reflecting that to people like FOLIO and his wife, Sights and Shews afford but small entertain­ment and no instruction: and that it would be al­most sufficient for the gratification of such minds, if Grand Solemnities, were to come round, like the year of Jubilee at Rome, or the blowing of the aloe, not above once in a hundred years.

TERRAE-FILIUS. NUMBER VI.

IT is necessary that TERRAE-FILIUS, like the Senior Proctor and other great officers of this University, should make an harangue at the Time of laying down his office; but it gives me [Page 255] infinite concern, that on this occasion, instead of glorying in so favourable an opportunity to display my merits, I am obliged to make it my chief en­deavour to wipe off a most infamous aspersion that has been thrown on my character, no less than the charge of being a Counterfeit and an Impostor. It is hard for a man on his death-bed to be put upon the proof of the reality of his existence, and though I am alive and merry, of which I hope you are all fully convinced, yet I cannot brook the thought that TERRAE-FILIUS, should be ac­counted a kind of Bastard Production, (or as the lawyers term it) NULLIUS FILIUS; and that it should be in the power of Envy or Malice to make a blot in my escutcheon. I do not doubt, how­ever, of being able to blazon my title, and to prove that I am neither an Usurper nor a Pretender.

It is true, indeed, that most of my ancestors were the most noted manufacturers of Scandal, and great wholesale dealers in Libel and Scandalum Magnatûm; and that in this glorious occupation they nobly sustained all the pains and inconve­niences of martyrdom and persecution. I must con­fess that my father was expelled the University for villifying the grave and reverend heads of houses, and that my grandfather was expelled the House [Page 256] of Commons for libelling the honourable mem­bers, and reviling the constitution. I cannot deny that most part of my family have, at divers times, had the honour of being pumped, beat, and tost in a blanket; that many of them have lain whole months in Newgate, and stood in the pillory at the Royal Exchange, Temple-Bar, and Charing Cross; and that of some I might even justly boast, that they were hanged for high-trea­son. I must own too that, for my own part, I nave not trod in the steps of my predecessors; and though I am not conscious of any shameful de­generacy, yet I have never been on the brink of expulsion for defamation. I have not so much as been taken up: I never had my house entered at midnight by king's messengers: neither I nor my printer can complain of the illegal seizure of our papers, or bring actions against the secretaries of state for false imprisonment: I never had the plea­sure of having my nose slit; I have as yet both my ears; and have not, according to what I have hitherto been able to discover, any prospect of dying at Tyburn or Kennington-Common.

For these reasons, ladies and gentlemen, as well as for the manner in which I have conducted myself in my office during the present Solemnity [Page 257] I find that some evil-minded persons have been in­duced to consider me and my writings as Spurious. They say, that I have disappointed their expecta­tions. They complain that I have offered no af­front to the Chancellor or any other person of qua­laty; nor turned the senior part of the University into objects of Ridicule for the entertainment of freshmen and under-graduates. They confess that at first they were induced to conceive better hopes of me, but that it may now be said of me, as it is of the month of March, that I came in like a lion, and go out like a lamb.

These and several other circumstances, which I cannot pretend to palliate or refute, I can, however, very easily account for. A Reverend Gentleman of Exeter College, eminent in all parts of Europe for his knowledge in Hebrew, in a late contested elec­tion being accused by the opposite party of time-serving, very shrewdly answered, in vindication of himself and his associates, that they did not make the times, but the times made them. The Univer­sity borrows its complection from its patrons, and the moon her light from the sun, and at a time when there is a general revolution of princi­ples, or to (invert a little the arrangement of the phrase) when Revolution-Principles are general [Page 258] among us, is it any wonder that the honest TERRAE-FILIUS should be as changeable as his Brethren?

I can remember the time, and indeed it is but a very little while ago, when a place was esteemed at Oxford as a badge of corruption, and a green coat the livery of servitude. I can remember too that a certain great patriot informed the House of Com­mons, that Oxford was paved with disaffection and Jacobitism. But now the old true blue is faced, according to the court-fashion, with green; and the red and white roses were not more closely twined together by the union of the houses of York and Lancaster, than the OLD and NEW INTEREST in this county by the coalition and compromise at the late election of Lord Charles Spenser and Sir James Dashwood. We have lived to see the staunch Doctor Blackstone on the point of being sent to Ire­land as a Judge, and honoured with a patent of precedency and a silk gown. We have lived to see Sir Francis Dashwood created Lord Le Despen­ser, and appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Master of the Wardrobe. Sir John Phillips it is well known is a Privy Counsellor, and our Right Honourable Chancellor is Captain of the Band of Pensioners. ‘ [Page 259]Tempora mutantur, et nos mutamur in illis.’ The Tories are all at court, and Oxonians are made Bishops. The Cocoa-Tree is running a race with Arthur's towards the golden goal of St. James's; and, it is said, that at the next meeting of the parliament a bill will be brought in for cleaning, lighting, and NEW-PAVING the streets of Oxford by the Right Honourable Mr, PITT.

I may be believed also when I declare, upon the Word and Honour of an AUTHOR, that it is not for want of information or materials, that I have not made my paper a Chronique Scandaleuse, a Journal of Defamation. I have received letters sufficient to form a volume, anecdotes without number, and satires, sonnets, epigrams, and acrosticks by wholesale. There is not a toast in the city or environs of Oxford, of whom I have not had a particular account; and there has not been a phaeton and four driven out of Oxford this sum­mer, or a single excursion to Wallingford, that has not been faithfully registered in MY black book. One correspondent has sent me a piece, which he calls the Secret History of Ditchley; and another has transmitted an exact detail of all the ceremo­nies on opening the newly-repaired church at West-Wycomb last Sunday, together with the copy [Page 260] of a carol on the occasion, which he tells me was written by Paul Whitehead, and sung over Milk Punch in the Golden Ball. In short, so willing are all to open the sluices of Scandal, that there is not a corner of the country from which I have not been favoured with some curious ar­ticles of intelligence, with an earnest desire of their being communicated to the publick by the channel of my paper, so that had I been disposed to sit in judgment upon them, care has been taken to provide me a handsome calendar of delinquents.

A great number of correspondents have very freely and abundantly communicated their observa­tions on the transactions of the present ENCAENIA: some have sent me criticisms on the verses and orations delivered in the theatre; and others have commented on the voice, gesture, and deportment of the speakers, greatly lamenting that Mr. SHE­RIDAN, as heretofore, was not employed to instruct our young nobility and gentry in the art of elocu­tion. One writer affects to be greatly disgusted at the vehemence and frequency of the plaudits of the upper gallery, bestowed indiscriminately on the Chancellor or a singer, Dr. KING or the first fiddle. Another is much offended that the pieces on this occasion are composed in no other lan­guages [Page 261] than Latin or English. At such a time, as well as in their printed gratulations, the mem­bers of the University might be expected to shew the extent of their learning, and we might not only, with the most modest expectation, have pro­mised ourselves several Greek odes after the man­ner of Pindar, and occasional pieces of Hebrew psalmody, but have flattered ourselves with the certain hopes of seeing the elegant figure of Mr. Swinton delivering an oration in Etruscan or Phoenician.

In this place, as I am settling the account with my correspondents, it is also proper to acknow­ledge the receipt of several remarks on the present state of the University, and hints for its improve­ment. A person who signs himself Londinensis, laments that the arts of politeness, as well as the polite arts, are not taught at Oxford, and proposes that Messieurs HART and DUKES, or at least one of them, should be invited down to instruct our grown gentlemen, thinking that he might be of as much service to the University, and make as bril­liant a figure in that art, as Dr. Hayes in Musick; on which consideration it might be expedient to ap­point him DANCING PROFESSOR. Another per­son, a facetious clergyman of uncommon parts, who [Page 262] dates his letter from Lincoln College, wishes to see the intended scheme of a riding-house, (to which the profits of the last collection of the Clarendon papers were supposed to be appropri­ated) carried into immediate execution. He fore­sees great advantage accruing to the church-mili­tant, from our Doctors in Divinty being taught to ride the Great Horse, and does not doubt but that, from their acknowledged skill in horsemanship, the Rector of his own house, Lincoln College, and the President of Corpus Christi, will instantly be appointed joint masters of the riding-house, and have the sole direction of the Manége.

I have also received several rough draughts and curious portraits of academical characters, with the names, for fear of mistake, at the bottom of the picture. A young buck of Christ Church has sent me a cutting satire on a severe discipli­narian, whose name and additions I do not think proper to mention; and a fellow of Trinity com­plains of being forced, with several more, to lay out an hundred pounds in taking a doctor's degree; and inveighs most bitterly against tuft-hunters, and a person whom he calls Doctor Driver.

These and several other articles of intelligence extraordinary, I have had virtue enough to sup­press, [Page 263] and think I deserve the publick thanks both of the Town and University, together with some more solid and substantial marks of their favour, for my extraordinary moderation. The affairs of the corporation are, I fear, too much perplext to make me any handsome gratuity; but, I hope, in consideration of my clemency towards them and my tenderness to their wives and daugh­ters, at least to have the compliment of my free­dom in a gold box, with a right of common on Port-Meadow. As to the University, I expect on the next publick occasion to be presented to an honorary degree, and that in the mean time, the Bursars of the several colleges will have direc­tions to make up a purse for TERRAE-FILIUS.

Publick writers, it is well known, have often been bought off, silenced with a bribe, or quieted with a pension, when the fears of fine, pillory, and imprisonment have had no influence over their resolutions, and all the terrors of the law have been let loose upon them in vain. Our own Times too will afford examples of writers, who, after having been disappointed of the expected Rewards from the hands of Power and Munificence, have turned from the pleasant path of Panegyrick, and gone upon the highway of Satire. For my own part, [Page 264] being naturally of a benevolent disposition, I had rather it should be made worth my while to pur­sue the smooth Turnpike-Road in which I have set out. At present, being the first of my family who has hot been expelled, I am resolved to take my leave in good humour, and shall conclude my present Course of Lectures with the words in which the late worthy Bishop of Cloyne, who had ev'ry virtue under Heaven, and who spent the last part of his life amongst us, used often to describe this University.