The Tradition tells us further, that he had afterwards a Sight of those dismal Habitations which are the Portion of ill Men after Death; and mentions several Molten Seas of Gold, in which were plunged the Souls of barbarous Europeans, [who [5]] put to the Sword so many Thousands of poor Indians for the sake of that precious Metal: But having already touched upon the chief Points of this Tradition, and exceeded the Measure of my Paper, I shall not give any further Account of it.

C.



[Footnote 1: Albertus Magnus, a learned Dominican who resigned, for love of study, his bishopric of Ratisbon, died at Cologne in 1280. In alchemy a distinction was made between stone and spirit, as between body and soul, substance and accident. The evaporable parts were called, in alchemy, spirit and soul and accident.]

[Footnote 2: See No. 50.]

[Footnote 3: described]

[Footnote 4: an]

[Footnote 5: that]



* * * * *



No. 57. Saturday, May 5, 1711. Addison.

'Quem praestare potest mulier galeata pudorem, Quae fugit a Sexu!'

Juv.

When the Wife of Hector, in Homer's Iliads, discourses with her Husband about the Battel in which he was going to engage, the Hero, desiring her to leave that Matter to his Care, bids her go to her Maids and mind her Spinning: [1] by which the Poet intimates, that Men and Women ought to busy themselves in their proper Spheres, and on such Matters only as are suitable to their respective Sex.

I am at this time acquainted with a young Gentleman, who has passed a great Part of his Life in the Nursery, and, upon Occasion, can make a Caudle or a Sack-Posset better than any Man in England. He is likewise a wonderful Critick in Cambrick and Muslins, and will talk an Hour together upon a Sweet-meat. He entertains his Mother every Night with Observations that he makes both in Town and Court: As what Lady shews the nicest Fancy in her Dress; what Man of Quality wears the fairest Whig; who has the finest Linnen, who the prettiest Snuff-box, with many other the like curious Remarks that may be made in good Company.

On the other hand I have very frequently the Opportunity of seeing a Rural Andromache, who came up to Town last Winter, and is one of the greatest Fox-hunters in the Country. She talks of Hounds and Horses, and makes nothing of leaping over a Six-bar Gate. If a Man tells her a waggish Story, she gives him a Push with her Hand in jest, and calls him an impudent Dog; and if her Servant neglects his Business, threatens to kick him out of the House. I have heard her, in her Wrath, call a Substantial Trades-man a Lousy Cur; and remember one Day, when she could not think of the Name of a Person, she described him in a large Company of Men and Ladies, by the Fellow with the Broad Shoulders.

If those Speeches and Actions, which in their own Nature are indifferent, appear ridiculous when they proceed from a wrong Sex, the Faults and Imperfections of one Sex transplanted into another, appear black and monstrous. As for the Men, I shall not in this Paper any further concern my self about them: but as I would fain contribute to make Womankind, which is the most beautiful Part of the Creation, entirely amiable, and wear out all those little Spots and Blemishes that are apt to rise among the Charms which Nature has poured out upon them, I shall dedicate this Paper to their Service. The Spot which I would here endeavour to clear them of, is that Party-Rage which of late Years is very much crept into their Conversation. This is, in its Nature, a Male Vice, and made up of many angry and cruel Passions that are altogether repugnant to the Softness, the Modesty, and those other endearing Qualities which are natural to the Fair Sex. Women were formed to temper Mankind, and sooth them into Tenderness and Compassion, not to set an Edge upon their Minds, and blow up in them those Passions which are too apt to rise of their own Accord. When I have seen a pretty Mouth uttering Calumnies and Invectives, what would not I have given to have stopt it? How have I been troubled to see some of the finest Features in the World grow pale, and tremble with Party-Rage? Camilla is one of the greatest Beauties in the British Nation, and yet values her self more upon being the Virago of one Party, than upon being the Toast of both. The Dear Creature, about a Week ago, encountered the fierce and beautiful Penthesilea across a Tea-Table; but in the Height of her Anger, as her Hand chanced to shake with the Earnestness of the Dispute, she scalded her Fingers, and spilt a Dish of Tea upon her Petticoat. Had not this Accident broke off the Debate, no Body knows where it would have ended.

There is one Consideration which I would earnestly recommend to all my Female Readers, and which, I hope, will have some weight with them. In short, it is this, that there is nothing so bad for the Face as Party-Zeal. It gives an ill-natured Cast to the Eye, and a disagreeable Sourness to the Look; besides, that it makes the Lines too strong, and flushes them worse than Brandy. I have seen a Woman's Face break out in Heats, as she has been talking against a great Lord, whom she had never seen in her Life; and indeed never knew a Party-Woman that kept her Beauty for a Twelvemonth. I would therefore advise all my Female Readers, as they value their Complexions, to let alone all Disputes of this Nature; though, at the same time, I would give free Liberty to all superannuated motherly Partizans to be as violent as they please, since there will be no Danger either of their spoiling their Faces, or of their gaining Converts.

[2] For my own part, I think a Man makes an odious and despicable Figure, that is violent in a Party: but a Woman is too sincere to mitigate the Fury of her Principles with Temper and Discretion, and to act with that Caution and Reservedness which are requisite in our Sex. When this unnatural Zeal gets into them, it throws them into ten thousand Heats and Extravagancies; their generous [Souls [3]] set no Bounds to their Love or to their Hatred; and whether a Whig or Tory, a Lap-Dog or a Gallant, an Opera or a Puppet-Show, be the Object of it, the Passion, while it reigns, engrosses the whole Woman.

I remember when Dr. Titus Oates [4] was in all his Glory, I accompanied my Friend WILL. [HONEYCOMB] [5] in a Visit to a Lady of his Acquaintance: We were no sooner sat down, but upon casting my Eyes about the Room, I found in almost every Corner of it a Print that represented the Doctor in all Magnitudes and Dimensions. A little after, as the Lady was discoursing my Friend, and held her Snuff-box in her Hand, who should I see in the Lid of it but the Doctor. It was not long after this, when she had Occasion for her Handkerchief, which upon the first opening discovered among the Plaits of it the Figure of the Doctor. Upon this my Friend WILL., who loves Raillery, told her, That if he was in Mr. Truelove's Place (for that was the Name for her Husband) she should be made as uneasy by a Handkerchief as ever Othello was. I am afraid, said she, Mr. [HONEYCOMB,[6]] you are a Tory; tell me truly, are you a Friend to the Doctor or not? WILL., instead of making her a Reply, smiled in her Face (for indeed she was very pretty) and told her that one of her Patches was dropping off. She immediately adjusted it, and looking a little seriously, Well, says she, I'll be hang'd if you and your silent Friend there are not against the Doctor in your Hearts, I suspected as much by his saying nothing. Upon this she took her Fan into her Hand, and upon the opening of it again displayed to us the Figure of the Doctor, who was placed with great Gravity among the Sticks of it. In a word, I found that the Doctor had taken Possession of her Thoughts, her Discourse, and most of her Furniture; but finding my self pressed too close by her Question, I winked upon my Friend to take his Leave, which he did accordingly.

C.



[Footnote 1: Hector's parting from Andromache, at the close of Book VI.

No more—but hasten to thy tasks at home, There guide the spindle, and direct the loom; Me glory summons to the martial scene, The field of combat is the sphere for men.]

[Footnote 2: Not a new paragraph in the first issue.]

[Footnote 3: "Souls (I mean those of ordinary Women)." This, however, was cancelled by an Erratum in the next number.]

[Footnote 4: Addison was six years old when Titus Oates began his 'Popish Plot' disclosures. Under a name which called up recollections of the vilest trading upon theological intolerance, he here glances at Dr. Henry Sacheverell, whose trial (Feb. 27-March 20, 1710) for his sermons in praise of the divine right of kings and contempt of the Whigs, and his sentence of suspension for three years, had caused him to be admired enthusiastically by all party politicians who were of his own way of thinking. The change of person pleasantly puts 'Tory' for 'Whig,' and avoids party heat by implying a suggestion that excesses are not all on one side. Sacheverell had been a College friend of Addison's. He is the 'dearest Harry' for whom, at the age of 22, Addison wrote his metrical 'Account of the greatest English Poets' which omitted Shakespeare from the list.]

[Footnotes 5: Honycombe]



* * * * *



No. 58. Monday, May 7, 1711. Addison.



Ut pictura poesis erit ...

Hor.

Nothing is so much admired, and so little understood, as Wit. No Author that I know of has written professedly upon it; and as for those who make any Mention of it, they only treat on the Subject as it has accidentally fallen in their Way, and that too in little short Reflections, or in general declamatory Flourishes, without entering into the Bottom of the Matter. I hope therefore I shall perform an acceptable Work to my Countrymen, if I treat at large upon this Subject; which I shall endeavour to do in a Manner suitable to it, that I may not incur the Censure which a famous Critick bestows upon one who had written a Treatise upon the Sublime in a low groveling Stile. I intend to lay aside a whole Week for this Undertaking, that the Scheme of my Thoughts may not be broken and interrupted; and I dare promise my self, if my Readers will give me a Week's Attention, that this great City will be very much changed for the better by next Saturday Night. I shall endeavour to make what I say intelligible to ordinary Capacities; but if my Readers meet with any Paper that in some Parts of it may be a little out of their Reach, I would not have them discouraged, for they may assure themselves the next shall be much clearer.

As the great and only End of these my Speculations is to banish Vice and Ignorance out of the Territories of Great-Britain, I shall endeavour as much as possible to establish among us a Taste of polite Writing. It is with this View that I have endeavoured to set my Readers right in several Points relating to Operas and Tragedies; and shall from time to time impart my Notions of Comedy, as I think they may tend to its Refinement and Perfection. I find by my Bookseller that these Papers of Criticism, with that upon Humour, have met with a more kind Reception than indeed I could have hoped for from such Subjects; for which Reason I shall enter upon my present Undertaking with greater Chearfulness.

In this, and one or two following Papers, I shall trace out the History of false Wit, and distinguish the several Kinds of it as they have prevailed in different Ages of the World. This I think the more necessary at present, because I observed there were Attempts on foot last Winter to revive some of those antiquated Modes of Wit that have been long exploded out of the Commonwealth of Letters. There were several Satyrs and Panegyricks handed about in Acrostick, by which Means some of the most arrant undisputed Blockheads about the Town began to entertain ambitious Thoughts, and to set up for polite Authors. I shall therefore describe at length those many Arts of false Wit, in which a Writer does not show himself a Man of a beautiful Genius, but of great Industry.

The first Species of false Wit which I have met with is very venerable for its Antiquity, and has produced several Pieces which have lived very near as long as the Iliad it self: I mean those short Poems printed among the minor Greek Poets, which resemble the Figure of an Egg, a Pair of Wings, an Ax, a Shepherd's Pipe, and an Altar.

[1] As for the first, it is a little oval Poem, and may not improperly be called a Scholar's Egg. I would endeavour to hatch it, or, in more intelligible Language, to translate it into English, did not I find the Interpretation of it very difficult; for the Author seems to have been more intent upon the Figure of his Poem, than upon the Sense of it.

The Pair of Wings consist of twelve Verses, or rather Feathers, every Verse decreasing gradually in its Measure according to its Situation in the Wing. The subject of it (as in the rest of the Poems which follow) bears some remote Affinity with the Figure, for it describes a God of Love, who is always painted with Wings.

The Ax methinks would have been a good Figure for a Lampoon, had the Edge of it consisted of the most satyrical Parts of the Work; but as it is in the Original, I take it to have been nothing else but the Posy of an Ax which was consecrated to Minerva, and was thought to have been the same that Epeus made use of in the building of the Trojan Horse; which is a Hint I shall leave to the Consideration of the Criticks. I am apt to think that the Posy was written originally upon the Ax, like those which our modern Cutlers inscribe upon their Knives; and that therefore the Posy still remains in its ancient Shape, tho' the Ax it self is lost.

The Shepherd's Pipe may be said to be full of Musick, for it is composed of nine different Kinds of Verses, which by their several Lengths resemble the nine Stops of the old musical Instrument, [that [2]] is likewise the Subject of the Poem. [3]

The Altar is inscribed with the Epitaph of Troilus the Son of Hecuba; which, by the way, makes me believe, that these false Pieces of Wit are much more ancient than the Authors to whom they are generally ascribed; at least I will never be perswaded, that so fine a Writer as Theocritus could have been the Author of any such simple Works.

It was impossible for a Man to succeed in these Performances who was not a kind of Painter, or at least a Designer: He was first of all to draw the Out-line of the Subject which he intended to write upon, and afterwards conform the Description to the Figure of his Subject. The Poetry was to contract or dilate itself according to the Mould in which it was cast. In a word, the Verses were to be cramped or extended to the Dimensions of the Frame that was prepared for them; and to undergo the Fate of those Persons whom the Tyrant Procrustes used to lodge in his Iron Bed; if they were too short, he stretched them on a Rack, and if they were too long, chopped off a Part of their Legs, till they fitted the Couch which he had prepared for them.

Mr. Dryden hints at this obsolete kind of Wit in one of the following Verses, [in his Mac Flecno;] which an English Reader cannot understand, who does not know that there are those little Poems abovementioned in the Shape of Wings and Altars.

... Chuse for thy Command Some peaceful Province in Acrostick Land; There may'st thou Wings display, and Altars raise, And torture one poor Word a thousand Ways.

This Fashion of false Wit was revived by several Poets of the last Age, and in particular may be met with among Mr. Herbert's Poems; and, if I am not mistaken, in the Translation of Du Bartas. [4]—I do not remember any other kind of Work among the Moderns which more resembles the Performances I have mentioned, than that famous Picture of King Charles the First, which has the whole Book of Psalms written in the Lines of the Face and the Hair of the Head. When I was last at Oxford I perused one of the Whiskers; and was reading the other, but could not go so far in it as I would have done, by reason of the Impatience of my Friends and Fellow-Travellers, who all of them pressed to see such a Piece of Curiosity. I have since heard, that there is now an eminent Writing-Master in Town, who has transcribed all the Old Testament in a full-bottomed Periwig; and if the Fashion should introduce the thick kind of Wigs which were in Vogue some few Years ago, he promises to add two or three supernumerary Locks that shall contain all the Apocrypha. He designed this Wig originally for King William, having disposed of the two Books of Kings in the two Forks of the Foretop; but that glorious Monarch dying before the Wig was finished, there is a Space left in it for the Face of any one that has a mind to purchase it.

But to return to our ancient Poems in Picture, I would humbly propose, for the Benefit of our modern Smatterers in Poetry, that they would imitate their Brethren among the Ancients in those ingenious Devices. I have communicated this Thought to a young Poetical Lover of my Acquaintance, who intends to present his Mistress with a Copy of Verses made in the Shape of her Fan; and, if he tells me true, has already finished the three first Sticks of it. He has likewise promised me to get the Measure of his Mistress's Marriage-Finger, with a Design to make a Posy in the Fashion of a Ring, which shall exactly fit it. It is so very easy to enlarge upon a good Hint, that I do not question but my ingenious Readers will apply what I have said to many other Particulars; and that we shall see the Town filled in a very little time with Poetical Tippets, Handkerchiefs, Snuff-Boxes, and the like Female Ornaments. I shall therefore conclude with a Word of Advice to those admirable English Authors who call themselves Pindarick Writers, [5] that they would apply themselves to this kind of Wit without Loss of Time, as being provided better than any other Poets with Verses of all Sizes and Dimensions.

C.



[Footnote 1: Not a new paragraph in the first issue.]

[Footnote 2: which]

[Footnote 3: The 'Syrinx' of Theocritus consists of twenty verses, so arranged that the length of each pair is less than that of the pair before, and the whole resembles the ten reeds of the mouth organ or Pan pipes ([Greek: syrigx]). The Egg is, by tradition, called Anacreon's. Simmias of Rhodes, who lived about B.C. 324, is said to have been the inventor of shaped verses. Butler in his 'Character of a Small Poet' said of Edward Benlowes:

'As for Altars and Pyramids in poetry, he has outdone all men that way; for he has made a gridiron and a frying-pan in verse, that besides the likeness in shape, the very tone and sound of the words did perfectly represent the noise that is made by those utensils.']

[Footnote 4: But a devout earnestness gave elevation to George Herbert's ingenious conceits. Joshua Sylvester's dedication to King James the First of his translation of the Divine Weeks and Works of Du Bartas has not this divine soul in its oddly-fashioned frame. It begins with a sonnet on the Royal Anagram 'James Stuart: A just Master;' celebrates his Majesty in French and Italian, and then fills six pages with verse built in his Majesty's honour, in the form of bases and capitals of columns, inscribed each with the name of one of the Muses. Puttenham's Art of Poetry, published in 1589, book II., ch. ii. contains the fullest account of the mysteries and varieties of this sort of versification.]

[Footnote 5: When the tyranny of French criticism had imprisoned nearly all our poetry in the heroic couplet, outside exercise was allowed only to those who undertook to serve under Pindar.]



* * * * *



No. 59. Tuesday, May 8, 1711. Addison.



'Operose Nihil agunt.'

Seneca.

There is nothing more certain than that every Man would be a Wit if he could, and notwithstanding Pedants of a pretended Depth and Solidity are apt to decry the Writings of a polite Author, as Flash and Froth, they all of them shew upon Occasion that they would spare no pains to arrive at the Character of those whom they seem to despise. For this Reason we often find them endeavouring at Works of Fancy, which cost them infinite Pangs in the Production. The Truth of it is, a Man had better be a Gally-Slave than a Wit, were one to gain that Title by those Elaborate Trifles which have been the Inventions of such Authors as were often Masters of great Learning but no Genius.

In my last Paper I mentioned some of these false Wits among the Ancients, and in this shall give the Reader two or three other Species of them, that flourished in the same early Ages of the World. The first I shall produce are the Lipogrammiatists [1] or Letter-droppers of Antiquity, that would take an Exception, without any Reason, against some particular Letter in the Alphabet, so as not to admit it once into a whole Poem. One Tryphiodorus was a great Master in this kind of Writing. He composed an Odyssey or Epick Poem on the Adventures of Ulysses, consisting of four and twenty Books, having entirely banished the Letter A from his first Book, which was called Alpha (as Lucus a non Lucendo) because there was not an Alpha in it. His second Book was inscribed Beta for the same Reason. In short, the Poet excluded the whole four and twenty Letters in their Turns, and shewed them, one after another, that he could do his Business without them.

It must have been very pleasant to have seen this Poet avoiding the reprobate Letter, as much as another would a false Quantity, and making his Escape from it through the several Greek Dialects, when he was pressed with it in any particular Syllable. For the most apt and elegant Word in the whole Language was rejected, like a Diamond with a Flaw in it, if it appeared blemished with a wrong Letter. I shall only observe upon this Head, that if the Work I have here mentioned had been now extant, the Odyssey of Tryphiodorus, in all probability, would have been oftner quoted by our learned Pedants, than the Odyssey of Homer. What a perpetual Fund would it have been of obsolete Words and Phrases, unusual Barbarisms and Rusticities, absurd Spellings and complicated Dialects? I make no question but it would have been looked upon as one of the most valuable Treasuries of the Greek Tongue.

I find likewise among the Ancients that ingenious kind of Conceit, which the Moderns distinguish by the Name of a Rebus, [2] that does not sink a Letter but a whole Word, by substituting a Picture in its Place. When Caesar was one of the Masters of the Roman Mint, he placed the Figure of an Elephant upon the Reverse of the Publick Mony; the Word Caesar signifying an Elephant in the Punick Language. This was artificially contrived by Caesar, because it was not lawful for a private Man to stamp his own Figure upon the Coin of the Commonwealth. Cicero, who was so called from the Founder of his Family, that was marked on the Nose with a little Wen like a Vetch (which is Cicer in Latin) instead of Marcus Tullius Cicero, order'd the Words Marcus Tullius with the Figure of a Vetch at the End of them to be inscribed on a publick Monument. [3] This was done probably to shew that he was neither ashamed of his Name or Family, notwithstanding the Envy of his Competitors had often reproached him with both. In the same manner we read of a famous Building that was marked in several Parts of it with the Figures of a Frog and a Lizard: Those Words in Greek having been the Names of the Architects, who by the Laws of their Country were never permitted to inscribe their own Names upon their Works. For the same Reason it is thought, that the Forelock of the Horse in the Antique Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius, represents at a Distance the Shape of an Owl, to intimate the Country of the Statuary, who, in all probability, was an Athenian. This kind of Wit was very much in Vogue among our own Countrymen about an Age or two ago, who did not practise it for any oblique Reason, as the Ancients abovementioned, but purely for the sake of being Witty. Among innumerable Instances that may be given of this Nature, I shall produce the Device of one Mr Newberry, as I find it mentioned by our learned Cambden in his Remains. Mr Newberry, to represent his Name by a Picture, hung up at his Door the Sign of a Yew-Tree, that had several Berries upon it, and in the midst of them a great golden N hung upon a Bough of the Tree, which by the Help of a little false Spelling made up the Word N-ew-berry.

I shall conclude this Topick with a Rebus, which has been lately hewn out in Free-stone, and erected over two of the Portals of Blenheim House, being the Figure of a monstrous Lion tearing to Pieces a little Cock. For the better understanding of which Device, I must acquaint my English Reader that a Cock has the Misfortune to be called in Latin by the same Word that signifies a Frenchman, as a Lion is the Emblem of the English Nation. Such a Device in so noble a Pile of Building looks like a Punn in an Heroick Poem; and I am very sorry the truly ingenious Architect would suffer the Statuary to blemish his excellent Plan with so poor a Conceit: But I hope what I have said will gain Quarter for the Cock, and deliver him out of the Lion's Paw.

I find likewise in ancient Times the Conceit of making an Eccho talk sensibly, and give rational Answers. If this could be excusable in any Writer, it would be in Ovid, where he introduces the Eccho as a Nymph, before she was worn away into nothing but a Voice. The learned Erasmus, tho' a Man of Wit and Genius, has composed a Dialogue [4] upon this silly kind of Device, and made use of an Eccho who seems to have been a very extraordinary Linguist, for she answers the Person she talks with in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, according as she found the Syllables which she was to repeat in any one of those learned Languages. Hudibras, in Ridicule of this false kind of Wit, has described Bruin bewailing the Loss of his Bear to a solitary Eccho, who is of great used to the Poet in several Disticks, as she does not only repeat after him, but helps out his Verse, and furnishes him with Rhymes.

_He rag'd, and kept as heavy a Coil as Stout Hercules for loss of_ Hylas; _Forcing the Valleys to repeat The Accents of his sad Regret; He beat his Breast, and tore his Hair, For Loss of his dear Crony Bear, That Eccho from the hollow Ground His Doleful Wailings did resound More wistfully, bu many times, Then in small Poets Splay-foot Rhymes, That make her, in her rueful Stories To answer to Introgatories, And most unconscionably depose Things of which She nothing knows: And when she has said all she can say, 'Tis wrested to the Lover's Fancy. Quoth he, O whither, wicked_ Bruin, _Art thou fled to my——-Eccho_, Ruin? _I thought th' hadst scorn'd to budge a Step for Fear. (Quoth Eccho)_ Marry guep. _Am not I here to take thy Part! Then what has quell'd thy stubborn Heart? Have these Bones rattled, and this Head So often in thy Quarrel bled? Nor did I ever winch or grudge it, For thy dear Sake. (Quoth she)_ Mum budget. _Think'st thou 'twill not be laid i' th' Dish. Thou turn'dst thy Back? Quoth Eccho_, Pish. To run from those th' hadst overcome Thus cowardly? Quoth Eccho_, Mum. _But what a-vengeance makes thee fly From me too, as thine Enemy? Or if thou hadst not Thought of me, Nor what I have endur'd for Thee, Yet Shame and Honour might prevail To keep thee thus for turning tail; For who will grudge to spend his Blood in His Honour's Cause? Quoth she_, A Pudding.



[Footnote 1: From [Greek: leip_o], I omit, [Greek: gramma], a letter. In modern literature there is a Pugna Porcorum (pig-fight) of which every word begins with a p, and there are Spanish odes from which all vowels but one are omitted. The earliest writer of Lipogrammatic verse is said to have been the Greek poet Lasus, born in Achaia 538 B.C. Lope de Vega wrote five novels, each with one of the five vowels excluded from it.]

[Footnote 2: This French name for an enigmatical device is said to be derived from the custom of the priests of Picardy at carnival time to set up ingenious jests upon current affairs, 'de rebus quae geruntur.']

[Footnote 3: Addison takes these illustrations from the chapter on 'Rebus or Name devises,' in that pleasant old book, Camden's Remains, which he presently cites. The next chapter in the 'Remains' is upon Anagrams.]

[Footnote 4: Colloquia Familiaria, under the title Echo. The dialogue is ingeniously contrived between a youth and Echo.]



* * * * *



No. 60. Wednesday, May 9, 1711. Addison.



'Hoc est quod palles? Cur quis non prandeat, Hoc est?'

Per. 'Sat. 3.'

Several kinds of false Wit that vanished in the refined Ages of the World, discovered themselves again in the Times of Monkish Ignorance.

As the Monks were the Masters of all that little Learning which was then extant, and had their whole Lives entirely disengaged from Business, it is no wonder that several of them, who wanted Genius for higher Performances, employed many Hours in the Composition of such Tricks in Writing as required much Time and little Capacity. I have seen half the AEneid turned into Latin Rhymes by one of the Beaux Esprits of that dark Age; who says in his Preface to it, that the AEneid wanted nothing but the Sweets of Rhyme to make it the most perfect Work in its Kind. I have likewise seen an Hymn in Hexameters to the Virgin Mary, which filled a whole Book, tho' it consisted but of the eight following Words.

Tot, tibi, sunt, Virgo, dotes, quot, sidera, Caelo.

Thou hast as many Virtues, O Virgin, as there are Stars in Heaven.

The Poet rung the [changes [1]] upon these eight several Words, and by that Means made his Verses almost as numerous as the Virtues and the Stars which they celebrated. It is no wonder that Men who had so much Time upon their Hands did not only restore all the antiquated Pieces of false Wit, but enriched the World with Inventions of their own. It was to this Age that we owe the Production of Anagrams,[2] which is nothing else but a Transmutation of one Word into another, or the turning of the same Set of Letters into different Words; which may change Night into Day, or Black into White, if Chance, who is the Goddess that presides over these Sorts of Composition, shall so direct. I remember a witty Author, in Allusion to this kind of Writing, calls his Rival, who (it seems) was distorted, and had his Limbs set in Places that did not properly belong to them, The Anagram of a Man.

When the Anagrammatist takes a Name to work upon, he considers it at first as a Mine not broken up, which will not shew the treasure it contains till he shall have spent many Hours in the Search of it: For it is his Business to find out one Word that conceals it self in another, and to examine the Letters in all the Variety of Stations in which they can possibly be ranged. I have heard of a Gentleman who, when this Kind of Wit was in fashion, endeavoured to gain his Mistress's Heart by it. She was one of the finest Women of her Age, and [known [3]] by the Name of the Lady Mary Boon. The Lover not being able to make any thing of Mary, by certain Liberties indulged to this kind of Writing, converted it into Moll; and after having shut himself up for half a Year, with indefatigable Industry produced an Anagram. Upon the presenting it to his Mistress, who was a little vexed in her Heart to see herself degraded into Moll Boon, she told him, to his infinite Surprise, that he had mistaken her Sirname, for that it was not Boon but Bohun.

... Ibi omnis Effusus labor ...

The lover was thunder-struck with his Misfortune, insomuch that in a little time after he lost his Senses, which indeed had been very much impaired by that continual Application he had given to his Anagram.

The Acrostick [4] was probably invented about the same time with the Anagram, tho' it is impossible to decide whether the Inventor of the one of the other [were [5]] the greater Blockhead. The Simple Acrostick is nothing but the Name or Title of a Person or Thing made out of the initial Letters of several Verses, and by that Means written, after the Manner of the Chinese, in a perpendicular Line. But besides these there are Compound Acrosticks, where the principal Letters stand two or three deep. I have seen some of them where the Verses have not only been edged by a Name at each Extremity, but have had the same Name running down like a Seam through the Middle of the Poem.

There is another near Relation of the Anagrams and Acrosticks, which is commonly [called [6]] a Chronogram. This kind of Wit appears very often on many modern Medals, especially those of Germany, [7] when they represent in the Inscription the Year in which they were coined. Thus we see on a Medal of Gustavus Adolphus the following Words, CHRISTVS DUX ERGO TRIVMPHVS. If you take the pains to pick the Figures out of the several Words, and range them in their proper Order, you will find they amount to MDCXVVVII, or 1627, the Year in which the Medal was stamped: For as some of the Letters distinguish themselves from the rest, and overtop their Fellows, they are to be considered in a double Capacity, both as Letters and as Figures. Your laborious German Wits will turn over a whole Dictionary for one of these ingenious Devices. A Man would think they were searching after an apt classical Term, but instead of that they are looking out a Word that has an L, and M, or a D in it. When therefore we meet with any of these Inscriptions, we are not so much to look in 'em for the Thought, as for the Year of the Lord.

The Boutz Rimez [8] were the Favourites of the French Nation for a whole Age together, and that at a Time when it abounded in Wit and Learning. They were a List of Words that rhyme to one another, drawn up by another Hand, and given to a Poet, who was to make a Poem to the Rhymes in the same Order that they were placed upon the List: The more uncommon the Rhymes were, the more extraordinary was the Genius of the Poet that could accommodate his Verses to them. I do not know any greater Instance of the Decay of Wit and Learning among the French (which generally follows the Declension of Empire) than the endeavouring to restore this foolish Kind of Wit. If the Reader will be at the trouble to see Examples of it, let him look into the new Mercure Galant; where the Author every Month gives a List of Rhymes to be filled up by the Ingenious, in order to be communicated to the Publick in the Mercure for the succeeding Month. That for the Month of November [last], which now lies before me, is as follows.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - Lauriers - - - - - - - - - - - - Guerriers - - - - - - - - - - - - - Musette - - - - - - - - - - - - - Lisette - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Cesars - - - - - - - - - - - - - Etendars - - - - - - - - - - - - - Houlette - - - - - - - - - - - - - -Folette

One would be amazed to see so learned a Man as Menage talking seriously on this Kind of Trifle in the following Passage.

Monsieur de la Chambre has told me that he never knew what he was going to write when he took his Pen into his Hand; but that one Sentence always produced another. For my own part, I never knew what I should write next when I was making Verses. In the first place I got all my Rhymes together, and was afterwards perhaps three or four Months in filling them up. I one Day shewed Monsieur Gombaud a Composition of this Nature, in which among others I had made use of the four following Rhymes, Amaryllis, Phillis, Marne, Arne, desiring him to give me his Opinion of it. He told me immediately, that my Verses were good for nothing. And upon my asking his Reason, he said, Because the Rhymes are too common; and for that Reason easy to be put into Verse. Marry, says I, if it be so, I am very well rewarded for all the Pains I have been at. But by Monsieur Gombaud's Leave, notwithstanding the Severity of the Criticism, the Verses were good.

Vid. MENAGIANA. Thus far the learned Menage, whom I have translated Word for Word. [9]

The first Occasion of these Bouts Rimez made them in some manner excusable, as they were Tasks which the French Ladies used to impose on their Lovers. But when a grave Author, like him above-mentioned, tasked himself, could there be anything more ridiculous? Or would not one be apt to believe that the Author played [booty [10]], and did not make his List of Rhymes till he had finished his Poem?

I shall only add, that this Piece of false Wit has been finely ridiculed by Monsieur Sarasin, in a Poem intituled, La Defaite des Bouts-Rimez, The Rout of the Bouts-Rimez. [11]

I must subjoin to this last kind of Wit the double Rhymes, which are used in Doggerel Poetry, and generally applauded by ignorant Readers. If the Thought of the Couplet in such Compositions is good, the Rhyme adds [little [12]] to it; and if bad, it will not be in the Power of the Rhyme to recommend it. I am afraid that great Numbers of those who admire the incomparable Hudibras, do it more on account of these Doggerel Rhymes than of the Parts that really deserve admiration. I am sure I have heard the

Pulpit, Drum Ecclesiastick, Was beat with fist instead of a Stick,

and

There was an ancient sage Philosopher Who had read Alexander Ross over,

more frequently quoted, than the finest Pieces of Wit in the whole Poem.

C.



[Footnote 1: chymes]

[Footnote 2: This is an error. [Greek: Anagramma] meant in old Greek what it now means. Lycophron, who lived B.C. 280, and wrote a Greek poem on Cassandra, was famous for his Anagrams, of which two survive. The Cabalists had a branch of their study called Themuru, changing, which made mystical anagrams of sacred names.]

[Footnote 3: was called]

[Footnote 4: The invention of Acrostics is attributed to Porphyrius Optatianus, a writer of the 4th century. But the arguments of the Comedies of Plautus are in form of acrostics, and acrostics occur in the original Hebrew of the 'Book of Psalms'.]

[Footnote 5: was]

[Footnote 6: known by the name of]

[Footnote 7: The Chronogram was popular also, especially among the Germans, for inscriptions upon marble or in books. More than once, also, in Germany and Belgium a poem was written in a hundred hexameters, each yielding a chronogram of the date it was to celebrate.]

[Footnote 8: Bouts rimes are said to have been suggested to the wits of Paris by the complaint of a verse turner named Dulot, who grieved one day over the loss of three hundred sonnets; and when surprise was expressed at the large number, said they were the 'rhymed ends,' that only wanted filling up.]

[Footnote 9: Menagiana, vol. I. p. 174, ed. Amst. 1713. The Menagiana were published in 4 volumes, in 1695 and 1696. Gilles Menage died at Paris in 1692, aged 79. He was a scholar and man of the world, who had a retentive memory, and, says Bayle,

'could say a thousand good things in a thousand pleasing ways.'

The repertory here quoted from is the best of the numerous collections of 'ana.']

[Footnote 10: double]

[Footnote 11: Jean Francois Sarasin, whose works were first collected by Menage, and published in 1656, two years after his death. His defeat of the Bouts-Rimes, has for first title 'Dulot Vaincu' is in four cantos, and was written in four or five days.]

[Footnote 12: nothing]



* * * * *



No. 61. Thursday, May 10, 1711. Addison.



'Non equidem studeo, bullalis ut mihi nugis Pagina turgescal, dare pondus idonea fumo.'

Pers.



There is no kind of false Wit which has been so recommended by the Practice of all Ages, as that which consists in a Jingle of Words, and is comprehended under the general Name of Punning. It is indeed impossible to kill a Weed, which the Soil has a natural Disposition to produce. The Seeds of Punning are in the Minds of all Men, and tho' they may be subdued by Reason, Reflection and good Sense, they will be very apt to shoot up in the greatest Genius, that is not broken and cultivated by the Rules of Art. Imitation is natural to us, and when it does not raise the Mind to Poetry, Painting, Musick, or other more noble Arts, it often breaks out in Punns and Quibbles.

Aristotle, in the Eleventh Chapter of his Book of Rhetorick, describes two or three kinds of Punns, which he calls Paragrams, among the Beauties of good Writing, and produces Instances of them out of some of the greatest Authors in the Greek Tongue. Cicero has sprinkled several of his Works with Punns, and in his Book where he lays down the Rules of Oratory, quotes abundance of Sayings as Pieces of Wit, which also upon Examination prove arrant Punns. But the Age in which the Punn chiefly flourished, was the Reign of King James the First. That learned Monarch was himself a tolerable Punnster, and made very few Bishops or Privy-Counsellors that had not some time or other signalized themselves by a Clinch, or a Conundrum. It was therefore in this Age that the Punn appeared with Pomp and Dignity. It had before been admitted into merry Speeches and ludicrous Compositions, but was now delivered with great Gravity from the Pulpit, or pronounced in the most solemn manner at the Council-Table. The greatest Authors, in their most serious Works, made frequent use of Punns. The Sermons of Bishop Andrews, and the Tragedies of Shakespear, are full of them. The Sinner was punned into Repentance by the former, as in the latter nothing is more usual than to see a Hero weeping and quibbling for a dozen Lines together.

I must add to these great Authorities, which seem to have given a kind of Sanction to this Piece of false Wit, that all the Writers of Rhetorick have treated of Punning with very great Respect, and divided the several kinds of it into hard Names, that are reckoned among the Figures of Speech, and recommended as Ornaments in Discourse. I remember a Country School-master of my Acquaintance told me once, that he had been in Company with a Gentleman whom he looked upon to be the greatest Paragrammatist among the Moderns. Upon Inquiry, I found my learned Friend had dined that Day with Mr. Swan, the famous Punnster; and desiring him to give me some Account of Mr. Swan's Conversation, he told me that he generally talked in the Paranomasia, that he sometimes gave into the Ploce, but that in his humble Opinion he shined most in the Antanaclasis.

I must not here omit, that a famous University of this Land was formerly very much infested with Punns; but whether or no this might not arise from the Fens and Marshes in which it was situated, and which are now drained, I must leave to the Determination of more skilful Naturalists.

After this short History of Punning, one would wonder how it should be so entirely banished out of the Learned World, as it is at present, especially since it had found a Place in the Writings of the most ancient Polite Authors. To account for this, we must consider, that the first Race of Authors, who were the great Heroes in Writing, were destitute of all Rules and Arts of Criticism; and for that Reason, though they excel later Writers in Greatness of Genius, they fall short of them in Accuracy and Correctness. The Moderns cannot reach their Beauties, but can avoid their Imperfections. When the World was furnished with these Authors of the first Eminence, there grew up another Set of Writers, who gained themselves a Reputation by the Remarks which they made on the Works of those who preceded them. It was one of the Employments of these Secondary Authors, to distinguish the several kinds of Wit by Terms of Art, and to consider them as more or less perfect, according as they were founded in Truth. It is no wonder therefore, that even such Authors as Isocrates, Plato, and Cicero, should have such little Blemishes as are not to be met with in Authors of a much inferior Character, who have written since those several Blemishes were discovered. I do not find that there was a proper Separation made between Punns and [true [1]] Wit by any of the Ancient Authors, except Quintilian and Longinus. But when this Distinction was once settled, it was very natural for all Men of Sense to agree in it. As for the Revival of this false Wit, it happened about the time of the Revival of Letters; but as soon as it was once detected, it immediately vanished and disappeared. At the same time there is no question, but as it has sunk in one Age and rose in another, it will again recover it self in some distant Period of Time, as Pedantry and Ignorance shall prevail upon Wit and Sense. And, to speak the Truth, I do very much apprehend, by some of the last Winter's Productions, which had their Sets of Admirers, that our Posterity will in a few Years degenerate into a Race of Punnsters: At least, a Man may be very excusable for any Apprehensions of this kind, that has seen Acrosticks handed about the Town with great Secrecy and Applause; to which I must also add a little Epigram called the Witches Prayer, that fell into Verse when it was read either backward or forward, excepting only that it Cursed one way and Blessed the other. When one sees there are actually such Pains-takers among our British Wits, who can tell what it may end in? If we must Lash one another, let it be with the manly Strokes of Wit and Satyr; for I am of the old Philosopher's Opinion, That if I must suffer from one or the other, I would rather it should be from the Paw of a Lion, than the Hoof of an Ass. I do not speak this out of any Spirit of Party. There is a most crying Dulness on both Sides. I have seen Tory Acrosticks and Whig Anagrams, and do not quarrel with either of them, because they are Whigs or Tories, but because they are Anagrams and Acrosticks.

But to return to Punning. Having pursued the History of a Punn, from its Original to its Downfal, I shall here define it to be a Conceit arising from the use of two Words that agree in the Sound, but differ in the Sense. The only way therefore to try a Piece of Wit, is to translate it into a different Language: If it bears the Test, you may pronounce it true; but if it vanishes in the Experiment, you may conclude it to have been a Punn. In short, one may say of a Punn, as the Countryman described his Nightingale, that it is vox et praeterea nihil, a Sound, and nothing but a Sound. On the contrary, one may represent true Wit by the Description which Aristinetus makes of a fine Woman; when she is dressed she is Beautiful, when she is undressed she is Beautiful; or as Mercerus has translated it [more Emphatically]

Induitur, formosa est: Exuitur, ipsa forma est.

C.



[Footnote 1: fine]



* * * * *



No. 62. Friday, May 11, 1711. Addison.



'Scribendi recte sapere est et principium et fons.'

Hor.

Mr. Lock has an admirable Reflexion upon the Difference of Wit and Judgment, whereby he endeavours to shew the Reason why they are not always the Talents of the same Person. His Words are as follows:

And hence, perhaps, may be given some Reason of that common Observation, That Men who have a great deal of Wit and prompt Memories, have not always the clearest Judgment, or deepest Reason. For Wit lying most in the Assemblage of Ideas, and putting those together with Quickness and Variety, wherein can be found any Resemblance or Congruity, thereby to make up pleasant Pictures and agreeable Visions in the Fancy; Judgment, on the contrary, lies quite on the other Side, In separating carefully one from another, Ideas wherein can be found the least Difference, thereby to avoid being misled by Similitude, and by Affinity to take one thing for another. This is a way of proceeding quite contrary to Metaphor and Allusion; wherein, for the most part, lies that Entertainment and Pleasantry of Wit which strikes so lively on the Fancy, and is therefore so acceptable to all People. [1]

This is, I think, the best and most Philosophical Account that I have ever met with of Wit, which generally, though not always, consists in such a Resemblance and Congruity of Ideas as this Author mentions. I shall only add to it, by way of Explanation, That every Resemblance of Ideas is not that which we call Wit, unless it be such an one that gives Delight and Surprise to the Reader: These two Properties seem essential to Wit, more particularly the last of them. In order therefore that the Resemblance in the Ideas be Wit, it is necessary that the Ideas should not lie too near one another in the Nature of things; for where the Likeness is obvious, it gives no Surprize. To compare one Man's Singing to that of another, or to represent the Whiteness of any Object by that of Milk and Snow, or the Variety of its Colours by those of the Rainbow, cannot be called Wit, unless besides this obvious Resemblance, there be some further Congruity discovered in the two Ideas that is capable of giving the Reader some Surprize. Thus when a Poet tells us, the Bosom of his Mistress is as white as Snow, there is no Wit in the Comparison; but when he adds, with a Sigh, that it is as cold too, it then grows into Wit. Every Reader's Memory may supply him with innumerable Instances of the same Nature. For this Reason, the Similitudes in Heroick Poets, who endeavour rather to fill the Mind with great Conceptions, than to divert it with such as are new and surprizing, have seldom any thing in them that can be called Wit. Mr. Lock's Account of Wit, with this short Explanation, comprehends most of the Species of Wit, as Metaphors, Similitudes, Allegories, AEnigmas, Mottos, Parables, Fables, Dreams, Visions, dramatick Writings, Burlesque, and all the Methods of Allusion: As there are many other Pieces of Wit, (how remote soever they may appear at first sight, from the foregoing Description) which upon Examination will be found to agree with it.

As true Wit generally consists in this Resemblance and Congruity of Ideas, false Wit chiefly consists in the Resemblance and Congruity sometimes of single Letters, as in Anagrams, Chronograms, Lipograms, and Acrosticks: Sometimes of Syllables, as in Ecchos and Doggerel Rhymes: Sometimes of Words, as in Punns and Quibbles; and sometimes of whole Sentences or Poems, cast into the Figures of Eggs, Axes, or Altars: Nay, some carry the Notion of Wit so far, as to ascribe it even to external Mimickry; and to look upon a Man as an ingenious Person, that can resemble the Tone, Posture, or Face of another.

As true Wit consists in the Resemblance of Ideas, and false Wit in the Resemblance of Words, according to the foregoing Instances; there is another kind of Wit which consists partly in the Resemblance of Ideas, and partly in the Resemblance of Words; which for Distinction Sake I shall call mixt Wit. This kind of Wit is that which abounds in Cowley, more than in any Author that ever wrote. Mr. Waller has likewise a great deal of it. Mr. Dryden is very sparing in it. Milton had a Genius much above it. Spencer is in the same Class with Milton. The Italians, even in their Epic Poetry, are full of it. Monsieur Boileau, who formed himself upon the Ancient Poets, has every where rejected it with Scorn. If we look after mixt Wit among the Greek Writers, we shall find it no where but in the Epigrammatists. There are indeed some Strokes of it in the little Poem ascribed to Musoeus, which by that, as well as many other Marks, betrays it self to be a modern Composition. If we look into the Latin Writers, we find none of this mixt Wit in Virgil, Lucretius, or Catullus; very little in Horace, but a great deal of it in Ovid, and scarce any thing else in Martial.

Out of the innumerable Branches of mixt Wit, I shall choose one Instance which may be met with in all the Writers of this Class. The Passion of Love in its Nature has been thought to resemble Fire; for which Reason the Words Fire and Flame are made use of to signify Love. The witty Poets therefore have taken an Advantage from the doubtful Meaning of the Word Fire, to make an infinite Number of Witticisms. Cowley observing the cold Regard of his Mistress's Eyes, and at the same Time their Power of producing Love in him, considers them as Burning-Glasses made of Ice; and finding himself able to live in the greatest Extremities of Love, concludes the Torrid Zone to be habitable. When his Mistress has read his Letter written in Juice of Lemmon by holding it to the Fire, he desires her to read it over a second time by Love's Flames. When she weeps, he wishes it were inward Heat that distilled those Drops from the Limbeck. When she is absent he is beyond eighty, that is, thirty Degrees nearer the Pole than when she is with him. His ambitious Love is a Fire that naturally mounts upwards; his happy Love is the Beams of Heaven, and his unhappy Love Flames of Hell. When it does not let him sleep, it is a Flame that sends up no Smoak; when it is opposed by Counsel and Advice, it is a Fire that rages the more by the Wind's blowing upon it. Upon the dying of a Tree in which he had cut his Loves, he observes that his written Flames had burnt up and withered the Tree. When he resolves to give over his Passion, he tells us that one burnt like him for ever dreads the Fire. His Heart is an AEtna, that instead of Vulcan's Shop incloses Cupid's Forge in it. His endeavouring to drown his Love in Wine, is throwing Oil upon the Fire. He would insinuate to his Mistress, that the Fire of Love, like that of the Sun (which produces so many living Creatures) should not only warm but beget. Love in another Place cooks Pleasure at his Fire. Sometimes the Poet's Heart is frozen in every Breast, and sometimes scorched in every Eye. Sometimes he is drowned in Tears, and burnt in Love, like a Ship set on Fire in the Middle of the Sea.

The Reader may observe in every one of these Instances, that the Poet mixes the Qualities of Fire with those of Love; and in the same Sentence speaking of it both as a Passion and as real Fire, surprizes the Reader with those seeming Resemblances or Contradictions that make up all the Wit in this kind of Writing. Mixt Wit therefore is a Composition of Punn and true Wit, and is more or less perfect as the Resemblance lies in the Ideas or in the Words: Its Foundations are laid partly in Falsehood and partly in Truth: Reason puts in her Claim for one Half of it, and Extravagance for the other. The only Province therefore for this kind of Wit, is Epigram, or those little occasional Poems that in their own Nature are nothing else but a Tissue of Epigrams. I cannot conclude this Head of mixt Wit, without owning that the admirable Poet out of whom I have taken the Examples of it, had as much true Wit as any Author that ever writ; and indeed all other Talents of an extraordinary Genius.

It may be expected, since I am upon this Subject, that I should take notice of Mr. Dryden's Definition of Wit; which, with all the Deference that is due to the Judgment of so great a Man, is not so properly a Definition of Wit, as of good writing in general. Wit, as he defines it, is 'a Propriety of Words and Thoughts adapted to the Subject.' [2] If this be a true Definition of Wit, I am apt to think that Euclid [was [3]] the greatest Wit that ever set Pen to Paper: It is certain that never was a greater Propriety of Words and Thoughts adapted to the Subject, than what that Author has made use of in his Elements. I shall only appeal to my Reader, if this Definition agrees with any Notion he has of Wit: If it be a true one I am sure Mr. Dryden was not only a better Poet, but a greater Wit than Mr. Cowley; and Virgil a much more facetious Man than either Ovid or Martial.

Bouhours, whom I look upon to be the most penetrating of all the French Criticks, has taken pains to shew, that it is impossible for any Thought to be beautiful which is not just, and has not its Foundation in the Nature of things: That the Basis of all Wit is Truth; and that no Thought can be valuable, of which good Sense is not the Ground-work. [4] Boileau has endeavoured to inculcate the same Notions in several Parts of his Writings, both in Prose and Verse. [5] This is that natural Way of Writing, that beautiful Simplicity, which we so much admire in the Compositions of the Ancients; and which no Body deviates from, but those who want Strength of Genius to make a Thought shine in its own natural Beauties. Poets who want this Strength of Genius to give that Majestick Simplicity to Nature, which we so much admire in the Works of the Ancients, are forced to hunt after foreign Ornaments, and not to let any Piece of Wit of what kind soever escape them. I look upon these writers as Goths in Poetry, who, like those in Architecture, not being able to come up to the beautiful Simplicity of the old Greeks and Romans, have endeavoured to supply its place with all the Extravagancies of an irregular Fancy. Mr. Dryden makes a very handsome Observation, on Ovid's writing a Letter from Dido to AEneas, in the following Words. [6]

'Ovid' says he, (speaking of Virgil's Fiction of Dido and AEneas) 'takes it up after him, even in the same Age, and makes an Ancient Heroine of Virgil's new-created Dido; dictates a Letter for her just before her Death to the ungrateful Fugitive; and, very unluckily for himself, is for measuring a Sword with a Man so much superior in Force to him on the same Subject. I think I may be Judge of this, because I have translated both. The famous Author of the Art of Love has nothing of his own; he borrows all from a greater Master in his own Profession, and, which is worse, improves nothing which he finds: Nature fails him, and being forced to his old Shift, he has Recourse to Witticism. This passes indeed with his soft Admirers, and gives him the Preference to Virgil in their Esteem.'

Were not I supported by so great an Authority as that of Mr. Dryden, I should not venture to observe, That the Taste of most of our English Poets, as well as Readers, is extremely Gothick. He quotes Monsieur Segrais [7] for a threefold Distinction of the Readers of Poetry: In the first of which he comprehends the Rabble of Readers, whom he does not treat as such with regard to their Quality, but to their Numbers and Coarseness of their Taste. His Words are as follow:

'Segrais has distinguished the Readers of Poetry, according to their Capacity of judging, into three Classes. [He might have said the same of Writers too, if he had pleased.] In the lowest Form he places those whom he calls Les Petits Esprits, such thingsas are our Upper-Gallery Audience in a Play-house; who like nothing but the Husk and Rind of Wit, prefer a Quibble, a Conceit, an Epigram, before solid Sense and elegant Expression: These are Mob Readers. If Virgil and Martial stood for Parliament-Men, we know already who would carry it. But though they make the greatest Appearance in the Field, and cry the loudest, the best on't is they are but a sort of French Huguenots, or Dutch Boors, brought over in Herds, but not Naturalized; who have not Lands of two Pounds per Annum in Parnassus, and therefore are not privileged to poll. Their Authors are of the same Level, fit to represent them on a Mountebank's Stage, or to be Masters of the Ceremonies in a Bear-garden: Yet these are they who have the most Admirers. But it often happens, to their Mortification, that as their Readers improve their Stock of Sense, (as they may by reading better Books, and by Conversation with Men of Judgment) they soon forsake them.'

I [must not dismiss this Subject without [8]] observing that as Mr. Lock in the Passage above-mentioned has discovered the most fruitful Source of Wit, so there is another of a quite contrary Nature to it, which does likewise branch it self out into several kinds. For not only the Resemblance, but the Opposition of Ideas, does very often produce Wit; as I could shew in several little Points, Turns and Antitheses, that I may possibly enlarge upon in some future Speculation.

C.



[Footnote 1: 'Essay concerning Human Understanding', Bk II. ch. II (p. 68 of ed. 1690; the first).]

[Footonote 2:

'If Wit has truly been defined as a Propriety of Thoughts and Words, then that definition will extend to all sorts of Poetry... Propriety of Thought is that Fancy which arises naturally from the Subject, or which the Poet adapts to it. Propriety of Words is the cloathing of these Thoughts with such Expressions as are naturally proper to them.'

Dryden's Preface to 'Albion and Albanius'.]

[Footnote 3: is]

[Footnote 4: Dominique Bouhours, a learned and accomplished Jesuit, who died in 1702, aged 75, was a Professor of the Humanities, in Paris, till the headaches by which he was tormented until death compelled him to resign his chair. He was afterwards tutor to the two young Princes of Longueville, and to the son of the minister Colbert. His best book was translated into English in 1705, as

'The Art of Criticism: or the Method of making a Right Judgment upon Subjects of Wit and Learning. Translated from the best Edition of the French, of the Famous Father Bouhours, by a Person of Quality. In Four Dialogues.'

Here he says:

'Truth is the first Quality, and, as it were, the foundation of Thought; the fairest is the faultiest, or, rather, those which pass for the fairest, are not really so, if they want this Foundation ... I do not understand your Doctrine, replies Philanthus, and I can scarce persuade myself that a witty Thought should be always founded on Truth: On the contrary, I am of the opinion of a famous Critic (i.e. Vavassor in his book on Epigrams) that Falsehood gives it often all its Grace, and is, as it were, the Soul of it,'

&c., pp, 6, 7, and the following.]

[Footnote 5: As in the lines

Tout doit tendre au Bon Sens: mais pour y parvenir Le chemin est glissant et penible a tenir.

'Art. Poetique', chant 1.

And again,

Aux depens du Bon Sens gardez de plaisanter.

'Art. Poetique', chant 3.]

[Footnote 6: Dedication of his translation of the 'AEneid' to Lord Normanby, near the middle; when speaking of the anachronism that made Dido and AEneas contemporaries.]

[Footnote 7: Jean Regnauld de Segrais, b. 1624, d. 1701, was of Caen, where he was trained by Jesuits for the Church, but took to Literature, and sought thereby to support four brothers and two sisters, reduced to want by the dissipations of his father. He wrote, as a youth, odes, songs, a tragedy, and part of a romance. Attracting, at the age of 20, the attention of a noble patron, he became, in 1647, and remained for the next 24 years, attached to the household of Mlle. de Montpensier. He was a favoured guest among the Precieuses of the Hotel Rambouillet, and was styled, for his acquired air of bon ton, the Voiture of Caen. In 1671 he was received by Mlle. de La Fayette. In 1676 he married a rich wife, at Caen, his native town, where he settled and revived the local 'Academy.' Among his works were translations into French verse of the 'AEneid' and 'Georgics'. In the dedication of his own translation of the 'AEneid' by an elaborate essay to Lord Normanby, Dryden refers much, and with high respect, to the dissertation prefixed by Segrais to his French version, and towards the end (on p. 80 where the essay occupies 100 pages), writes as above quoted. The first parenthesis is part of the quotation.]

[Footnote 8: "would not break the thread of this discourse without;" and an ERRATUM appended to the next Number says, 'for without read with.']



* * * * *



No. 63. Saturday, May 12, 1711. Addison.



'Humano capiti cervicem pictor equinam Jungere si velit et varias inducere plumas Undique collatis membris, ut turpiter atrum Desinat in piscem mulier formosa superne; Spectatum admissi risum teneatis amici? Credite, Pisones, isti tabulae fore librum Persimilem, cujus, velut aegri somnia, vanae Finguntur species ...'

Hor.

It is very hard for the Mind to disengage it self from a Subject in which it has been long employed. The Thoughts will be rising of themselves from time to time, tho' we give them no Encouragement; as the Tossings and Fluctuations of the Sea continue several Hours after the Winds are laid.

It is to this that I impute my last Night's Dream or Vision, which formed into one continued Allegory the several Schemes of Wit, whether False, Mixed, or True, that have been the Subject of my late Papers.

Methoughts I was transported into a Country that was filled with Prodigies and Enchantments, governed by the Goddess of FALSEHOOD, entitled the Region of False Wit. There is nothing in the Fields, the Woods, and the Rivers, that appeared natural. Several of the Trees blossomed in Leaf-Gold, some of them produced Bone-Lace, and some of them precious Stones. The Fountains bubbled in an Opera Tune, and were filled with Stags, Wild-Boars, and Mermaids, that lived among the Waters; at the same time that Dolphins and several kinds of Fish played upon the Banks or took their Pastime in the Meadows. The Birds had many of them golden Beaks, and human Voices. The Flowers perfumed the Air with Smells of Incense, Amber-greese, and Pulvillios; [1] and were so interwoven with one another, that they grew up in Pieces of Embroidery. The Winds were filled with Sighs and Messages of distant Lovers. As I was walking to and fro in this enchanted Wilderness, I could not forbear breaking out into Soliloquies upon the several Wonders which lay before me, when, to my great Surprize, I found there were artificial Ecchoes in every Walk, that by Repetitions of certain Words which I spoke, agreed with me, or contradicted me, in every thing I said. In the midst of my Conversation with these invisible Companions, I discovered in the Centre of a very dark Grove a monstrous Fabrick built after the Gothick manner, and covered with innumerable Devices in that barbarous kind of Sculpture. I immediately went up to it, and found it to be a kind of Heathen Temple consecrated to the God of Dullness. Upon my Entrance I saw the Deity of the Place dressed in the Habit of a Monk, with a Book in one Hand and a Rattle in the other. Upon his right Hand was Industry, with a Lamp burning before her; and on his left Caprice, with a Monkey sitting on her Shoulder. Before his Feet there stood an Altar of a very odd Make, which, as I afterwards found, was shaped in that manner to comply with the Inscription that surrounded it. Upon the Altar there lay several Offerings of Axes, Wings, and Eggs, cut in Paper, and inscribed with Verses. The Temple was filled with Votaries, who applied themselves to different Diversions, as their Fancies directed them. In one part of it I saw a Regiment of Anagrams, who were continually in motion, turning to the Right or to the Left, facing about, doubling their Ranks, shifting their Stations, and throwing themselves into all the Figures and Countermarches of the most changeable and perplexed Exercise.

Not far from these was a Body of Acrosticks, made up of very disproportioned Persons. It was disposed into three Columns, the Officers planting themselves in a Line on the left Hand of each Column. The Officers were all of them at least Six Foot high, and made three Rows of very proper Men; but the Common Soldiers, who filled up the Spaces between the Officers, were such Dwarfs, Cripples, and Scarecrows, that one could hardly look upon them without laughing. There were behind the Acrosticks two or three Files of Chronograms, which differed only from the former, as their Officers were equipped (like the Figure of Time) with an Hour-glass in one Hand, and a Scythe in the other, and took their Posts promiscuously among the private Men whom they commanded.

In the Body of the Temple, and before the very Face of the Deity, methought I saw the Phantom of Tryphiodorus the Lipogrammatist, engaged in a Ball with four and twenty Persons, who pursued him by Turns thro' all the Intricacies and Labyrinths of a Country Dance, without being able to overtake him.

Observing several to be very busie at the Western End of the Temple, I inquired into what they were doing, and found there was in that Quarter the great Magazine of Rebus's. These were several Things of the most different Natures tied up in Bundles, and thrown upon one another in heaps like Faggots. You might behold an Anchor, a Night-rail, and a Hobby-horse bound up together. One of the Workmen seeing me very much surprized, told me, there was an infinite deal of Wit in several of those Bundles, and that he would explain them to me if I pleased; I thanked him for his Civility, but told him I was in very great haste at that time. As I was going out of the Temple, I observed in one Corner of it a Cluster of Men and Women laughing very heartily, and diverting themselves at a Game of Crambo. I heard several Double Rhymes as I passed by them, which raised a great deal of Mirth.

Not far from these was another Set of merry People engaged at a Diversion, in which the whole Jest was to mistake one Person for another. To give Occasion for these ludicrous Mistakes, they were divided into Pairs, every Pair being covered from Head to Foot with the same kind of Dress, though perhaps there was not the least Resemblance in their Faces. By this means an old Man was sometimes mistaken for a Boy, a Woman for a Man, and a Black-a-moor for an European, which very often produced great Peals of Laughter. These I guessed to be a Party of Punns. But being very desirous to get out of this World of Magick, which had almost turned my Brain, I left the Temple, and crossed over the Fields that lay about it with all the Speed I could make. I was not gone far before I heard the Sound of Trumpets and Alarms, which seemed to proclaim the March of an Enemy; and, as I afterwards found, was in reality what I apprehended it. There appeared at a great Distance a very shining Light, and, in the midst of it, a Person of a most beautiful Aspect; her Name was TRUTH. On her right Hand there marched a Male Deity, who bore several Quivers on his Shoulders,—and grasped several Arrows in his Hand. His Name was Wit. The Approach of these two Enemies filled all the Territories of False Wit with an unspeakable Consternation, insomuch that the Goddess of those Regions appeared in Person upon her Frontiers, with the several inferior Deities, and the different Bodies of Forces which I had before seen in the Temple, who were now drawn up in Array, and prepared to give their Foes a warm Reception. As the March of the Enemy was very slow, it gave time to the several Inhabitants who bordered upon the Regions of FALSEHOOD to draw their Forces into a Body, with a Design to stand upon their Guard as Neuters, and attend the Issue of the Combat.

I must here inform my Reader, that the Frontiers of the Enchanted Region, which I have before described, were inhabited by the Species of MIXED WIT, who made a very odd Appearance when they were mustered together in an Army. There were Men whose Bodies were stuck full of Darts, and Women whose Eyes were Burning-glasses: Men that had Hearts of Fire, and Women that had Breasts of Snow. It would be endless to describe several Monsters of the like Nature, that composed this great Army; which immediately fell asunder and divided itself into two Parts, the one half throwing themselves behind the Banners of TRUTH, and the others behind those of FALSEHOOD.

The Goddess of FALSEHOOD was of a Gigantick Stature, and advanced some Paces before the Front of her Army: but as the dazling Light, which flowed from TRUTH, began to shine upon her, she faded insensibly; insomuch that in a little Space she looked rather like an huge Phantom, than a real Substance. At length, as the Goddess of TRUTH approached still nearer to her, she fell away entirely, and vanished amidst the Brightness of her Presence; so that there did not remain the least Trace or Impression of her Figure in the Place where she had been seen.

As at the rising of the Sun the Constellations grow thin, and the Stars go out one after another, till the whole Hemisphere is extinguished; such was the vanishing of the Goddess: And not only of the Goddess her self, but of the whole Army that attended her, which sympathized with their Leader, and shrunk into Nothing, in proportion as the Goddess disappeared. At the same time the whole Temple sunk, the Fish betook themselves to the Streams, and the wild Beasts to the Woods: The Fountains recovered their Murmurs, the Birds their Voices, the Trees their Leaves, the Flowers their Scents, and the whole Face of Nature its true and genuine Appearance. Tho' I still continued asleep, I fancied my self as it were awakened out of a Dream, when I saw this Region of Prodigies restored to Woods and Rivers, Fields and Meadows.

Upon the removal of that wild Scene of Wonders, which had very much disturbed my Imagination, I took a full Survey of the Persons of WIT and TRUTH; for indeed it was impossible to look upon the first, without seeing the other at the same time. There was behind them a strong and compact Body of Figures. The Genius of Heroic Poetry appeared with a Sword in her Hand, and a Lawrel on her Head. Tragedy was crowned with Cypress, and covered with Robes dipped in Blood. Satyr had Smiles in her Look, and a Dagger under her Garment. Rhetorick was known by her Thunderbolt; and Comedy by her Mask. After several other Figures, Epigram marched up in the Rear, who had been posted there at the Beginning of the Expedition, that he might not revolt to the Enemy, whom he was suspected to favour in his Heart. I was very much awed and delighted with the Appearance of the God of Wit; there was something so amiable and yet so piercing in his Looks, as inspired me at once with Love and Terror. As I was gazing on him, to my unspeakable Joy, he took a Quiver of Arrows from his Shoulder, in order to make me a Present of it; but as I was reaching out my Hand to receive it of him, I knocked it against a Chair, and by that means awaked.

C.



[Footnote 1: Scent bags. Ital. Polviglio; from Pulvillus, a little cushion.]



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No. 64. Monday, May 14, 1711. Steele.



'... Hic vivimus Ambitiosa Paupertate omnes ...'

Juv.

The most improper things we commit in the Conduct of our Lives, we are led into by the Force of Fashion. Instances might be given, in which a prevailing Custom makes us act against the Rules of Nature, Law and common Sense: but at present I shall confine my Consideration of the Effect it has upon Men's Minds, by looking into our Behaviour when it is the Fashion to go into Mourning. The Custom of representing the Grief we have for the Loss of the Dead by our Habits, certainly had its Rise from the real Sorrow of such as were too much distressed to take the proper Care they ought of their Dress. By Degrees it prevailed, that such as had this inward Oppression upon their Minds, made an Apology for not joining with the rest of the World in their ordinary Diversions, by a Dress suited to their Condition. This therefore was at first assumed by such only as were under real Distress; to whom it was a Relief that they had nothing about them so light and gay as to be irksome to the Gloom and Melancholy of their inward Reflections, or that might misrepresent them to others. In process of Time this laudable Distinction of the Sorrowful was lost, and Mourning is now worn by Heirs and Widows. You see nothing but Magnificence and Solemnity in the Equipage of the Relict, and an Air [of [1]] Release from Servitude in the Pomp of a Son who has lost a wealthy Father. This Fashion of Sorrow is now become a generous Part of the Ceremonial between Princes and Sovereigns, who in the Language of all Nations are stiled Brothers to each other, and put on the Purple upon the Death of any Potentate with whom they live in Amity. Courtiers, and all who wish themselves such, are immediately seized with Grief from Head to Foot upon this Disaster to their Prince; so that one may know by the very Buckles of a Gentleman-Usher, what Degree of Friendship any deceased Monarch maintained with the Court to which he belongs. A good Courtier's Habit and Behaviour is hieroglyphical on these Occasions: He deals much in Whispers, and you may see he dresses according to the best Intelligence.

The general Affectation among Men, of appearing greater than they are, makes the whole World run into the Habit of the Court. You see the Lady, who the Day before was as various as a Rainbow, upon the Time appointed for beginning to mourn, as dark as a Cloud. This Humour does not prevail only on those whose Fortunes can support any Change in their Equipage, not on those only whose Incomes demand the Wantonness of new Appearances; but on such also who have just enough to cloath them. An old Acquaintance of mine, of Ninety Pounds a Year, who has naturally the Vanity of being a Man of Fashion deep at his Heart, is very much put to it to bear the Mortality of Princes. He made a new black Suit upon the Death of the King of Spain, he turned it for the King of Portugal, and he now keeps his Chamber while it is scouring for the Emperor. [2] He is a good Oeconomist in his Extravagance, and makes only a fresh black Button upon his Iron-gray Suit for any Potentate of small Territories; he indeed adds his Crape Hatband for a Prince whose Exploits he has admired in the Gazette. But whatever Compliments may be made on these Occasions, the true Mourners are the Mercers, Silkmen, Lacemen and Milliners. A Prince of merciful and royal Disposition would reflect with great Anxiety upon the Prospect of his Death, if he considered what Numbers would be reduced to Misery by that Accident only: He would think it of Moment enough to direct, that in the Notification of his Departure, the Honour done to him might be restrained to those of the Houshold of the Prince to whom it should be signified. He would think a general Mourning to be in a less Degree the same Ceremony which is practised in barbarous Nations, of killing their Slaves to attend the Obsequies of their Kings.

I had been wonderfully at a Loss for many Months together, to guess at the Character of a Man who came now and then to our Coffee-house: He ever ended a News-paper with this Reflection, Well, I see all the Foreign Princes are in good Health. If you asked, Pray, Sir, what says the Postman from Vienna? he answered, Make us thankful, the German Princes are all well: What does he say from Barcelona? He does not speak but that the Country agrees very well with the new Queen. After very much Enquiry, I found this Man of universal Loyalty was a wholesale Dealer in Silks and Ribbons: His Way is, it seems, if he hires a Weaver, or Workman, to have it inserted in his Articles,

'That all this shall be well and truly performed, provided no foreign Potentate shall depart this Life within the Time above-mentioned.'

It happens in all publick Mournings, that the many Trades which depend upon our Habits, are during that Folly either pinched with present Want, or terrified with the apparent Approach of it. All the Atonement which Men can make for wanton Expences (which is a sort of insulting the Scarcity under which others labour) is, that the Superfluities of the Wealthy give Supplies to the Necessities of the Poor: but instead of any other Good arising from the Affectation of being in courtly Habits of Mourning, all Order seems to be destroyed by it; and the true Honour which one Court does to another on that Occasion, loses its Force and Efficacy. When a foreign Minister beholds the Court of a Nation (which flourishes in Riches and Plenty) lay aside, upon the Loss of his Master, all Marks of Splendor and Magnificence, though the Head of such a joyful People, he will conceive greater Idea of the Honour done his Master, than when he sees the Generality of the People in the same Habit. When one is afraid to ask the Wife of a Tradesman whom she has lost of her Family; and after some Preparation endeavours to know whom she mourns for; how ridiculous is it to hear her explain her self, That we have lost one of the House of Austria! Princes are elevated so highly above the rest of Mankind, that it is a presumptuous Distinction to take a Part in Honours done to their Memories, except we have Authority for it, by being related in a particular Manner to the Court which pays that Veneration to their Friendship, and seems to express on such an Occasion the Sense of the Uncertainty of human Life in general, by assuming the Habit of Sorrow though in the full possession of Triumph and Royalty.

R.



[Footnote 1: of a]

[Footnote 2: The death of Charles II of Spain, which gave occasion for the general war of the Spanish succession, took place in 1700. John V, King of Portugal, died in 1706, and the Emperor Joseph I died on the 17th of April, 1711, less than a month before this paper was written. The black suit that was now 'scouring for the Emperor' was, therefore, more than ten years old, and had been turned five years ago.]



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No. 65. Tuesday, May 15, 1711. Steele.



'... Demetri teque Tigelli Discipularum inter jubeo plorare cathedras.'

Hor.

After having at large explained what Wit is, and described the false Appearances of it, all that Labour seems but an useless Enquiry, without some Time be spent in considering the Application of it. The Seat of Wit, when one speaks as a Man of the Town and the World, is the Play-house; I shall therefore fill this Paper with Reflections upon the Use of it in that Place. The Application of Wit in the Theatre has as strong an Effect upon the Manners of our Gentlemen, as the Taste of it has upon the Writings of our Authors. It may, perhaps, look like a very presumptuous Work, though not Foreign from the Duty of a SPECTATOR, to tax the Writings of such as have long had the general Applause of a Nation; But I shall always make Reason, Truth, and Nature the Measures of Praise and Dispraise; if those are for me, the Generality of Opinion is of no Consequence against me; if they are against me, the general Opinion cannot long support me.

Without further Preface, I am going to look into some of our most applauded Plays, and see whether they deserve the Figure they at present bear in the Imagination of Men, or not.

In reflecting upon these Works, I shall chiefly dwell upon that for which each respective Play is most celebrated. The present Paper shall be employed upon Sir Fopling Flutter. [1] The received Character of this Play is, That it is the Pattern of Genteel Comedy. Dorimant and Harriot are the Characters of greatest Consequence, and if these are Low and Mean, the Reputation of the Play is very Unjust.

I will take for granted, that a fine Gentleman should be honest in his Actions, and refined in his Language. Instead of this, our Hero in this Piece is a direct Knave in his Designs, and a Clown in his Language. Bellair is his Admirer and Friend; in return for which, because he is forsooth a greater Wit than his said Friend, he thinks it reasonable to persuade him to marry a young Lady, whose Virtue, he thinks, will last no longer than till she is a Wife, and then she cannot but fall to his Share, as he is an irresistible fine Gentleman. The Falshood to Mrs. Loveit, and the Barbarity of Triumphing over her Anguish for losing him, is another Instance of his Honesty, as well as his Good-nature. As to his fine Language; he calls the Orange-Woman, who, it seems, is inclined to grow Fat, An Over-grown Jade, with a Flasket of Guts before her; and salutes her with a pretty Phrase of How now, Double Tripe? Upon the mention of a Country Gentlewoman, whom he knows nothing of, (no one can imagine why) he will lay his Life she is some awkward ill-fashioned Country Toad, who not having above four Dozen of Hairs on her Head, has adorned her Baldness with a large white Fruz, that she may look Sparkishly in the Forefront of the King's Box at an old Play. Unnatural Mixture of senseless Common-Place!

As to the Generosity of his Temper, he tells his poor Footman, If he did not wait better—he would turn him away, in the insolent Phrase of, I'll uncase you.

Now for Mrs. Harriot: She laughs at Obedience to an absent Mother, whose Tenderness Busie describes to be very exquisite, for that she is so pleased with finding Harriot again, that she cannot chide her for being out of the way. This Witty Daughter, and fine Lady, has so little Respect for this good Woman, that she Ridicules her Air in taking Leave, and cries, In what Struggle is my poor Mother yonder? See, see, her Head tottering, her Eyes staring, and her under Lip trembling. But all this is atoned for, because she has more Wit than is usual in her Sex, and as much Malice, tho' she is as Wild as you would wish her and has a Demureness in her Looks that makes it so surprising! Then to recommend her as a fit Spouse for his Hero, the Poet makes her speak her Sense of Marriage very ingeniously: I think, says she, I might be brought to endure him, and that is all a reasonable Woman should expect in an Husband. It is, methinks, unnatural that we are not made to understand how she that was bred under a silly pious old Mother, that would never trust her out of her sight, came to be so Polite.

It cannot be denied, but that the Negligence of every thing, which engages the Attention of the sober and valuable Part of Mankind, appears very well drawn in this Piece: But it is denied, that it is necessary to the Character of a Fine Gentleman, that he should in that manner trample upon all Order and Decency. As for the Character of Dorimant, it is more of a Coxcomb than that of Fopling. He says of one of his Companions, that a good Correspondence between them is their mutual Interest. Speaking of that Friend, he declares, their being much together makes the Women think the better of his Understanding, and judge more favourably of my Reputation. It makes him pass upon some for a Man of very good Sense, and me upon others for a very civil Person.

This whole celebrated Piece is a perfect Contradiction to good Manners, good Sense, and common Honesty; and as there is nothing in it but what is built upon the Ruin of Virtue and Innocence, according to the Notion of Merit in this Comedy, I take the Shoemaker to be, in reality, the Fine Gentleman of the Play: For it seems he is an Atheist, if we may depend upon his Character as given by the Orange-Woman, who is her self far from being the lowest in the Play. She says of a Fine Man who is Dorimant's Companion, There is not such another Heathen in the Town, except the Shoemaker. His Pretension to be the Hero of the Drama appears still more in his own Description of his way of Living with his Lady. There is, says he, never a Man in Town lives more like a Gentleman with his Wife than I do; I never mind her Motions; she never enquires into mine. We speak to one another civilly, hate one another heartily; and because it is Vulgar to Lye and Soak together, we have each of us our several Settle-Bed. That of Soaking together is as good as if Dorimant had spoken it himself; and, I think, since he puts Human Nature in as ugly a Form as the Circumstances will bear, and is a staunch Unbeliever, he is very much Wronged in having no part of the good Fortune bestowed in the last Act.

To speak plainly of this whole Work, I think nothing but being lost to a sense of Innocence and Virtue can make any one see this Comedy, without observing more frequent Occasion to move Sorrow and Indignation, than Mirth and Laughter. At the same time I allow it to be Nature, but it is Nature in its utmost Corruption and Degeneracy. [2]

R.



[Footnote 1: 'The Man of Mode', or 'Sir Fopling Flutter', by Sir George Etherege, produced in 1676. Etherege painted accurately the life and morals of the Restoration, and is said to have represented himself in Bellair; Beau Hewit, the son of a Herefordshire Baronet, in Sir Fopling; and to have formed Dorimant upon the model of the Earl of Rochester.]

[Footnote 2: To this number of the Spectator is appended the first advertisement of Pope's 'Essay on Criticism'.

This Day is publish'd An ESSAY on CRITICISM.

Printed for W. Lewis in Russell street Covent-Garden; and Sold by W. Taylor, at the Ship in Pater Noster Row; T. Osborn, in Gray's Inn near the Walks; T. Graves, in St. James's Street; and T. Morphew, near Stationers-Hall.

Price 1s.]



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No. 66. Wednesday, May 16, 1711. Steele.



'Motus doceri gaudet Ionicos Matura Virgo, et fingitur artubus Jam nunc, et incestos amores De Tenero meditatur Ungui.'

Hor.



The two following Letters are upon a Subject of very great Importance, tho' expressed without an Air of Gravity.

To the SPECTATOR.

SIR, I Take the Freedom of asking your Advice in behalf of a Young Country Kinswoman of mine who is lately come to Town, and under my Care for her Education. She is very pretty, but you can't imagine how unformed a Creature it is. She comes to my Hands just as Nature left her, half-finished, and without any acquired Improvements. When I look on her I often think of the Belle Sauvage mentioned in one of your Papers. Dear Mr. SPECTATOR, help me to make her comprehend the visible Graces of Speech, and the dumb Eloquence of Motion; for she is at present a perfect Stranger to both. She knows no Way to express her self but by her Tongue, and that always to signify her Meaning. Her Eyes serve her yet only to see with, and she is utterly a Foreigner to the Language of Looks and Glances. In this I fancy you could help her better than any Body. I have bestowed two Months in teaching her to Sigh when she is not concerned, and to Smile when she is not pleased; and am ashamed to own she makes little or no Improvement. Then she is no more able now to walk, than she was to go at a Year old. By Walking you will easily know I mean that regular but easy Motion, which gives our Persons so irresistible a Grace as if we moved to Musick, and is a kind of disengaged Figure, or, if I may so speak, recitative Dancing. But the want of this I cannot blame in her, for I find she has no Ear, and means nothing by Walking but to change her Place. I could pardon too her Blushing, if she knew how to carry her self in it, and if it did not manifestly injure her Complexion.

They tell me you are a Person who have seen the World, and are a Judge of fine Breeding; which makes me ambitious of some Instructions from you for her Improvement: Which when you have favoured me with, I shall further advise with you about the Disposal of this fair Forrester in Marriage; for I will make it no Secret to you, that her Person and Education are to be her Fortune. I am, SIR, Your very humble Servant CELIMENE.