doubt Sir Roger knows the full value of these returns: and if beforehand he had computed the charges of the chase, a gentleman of his discretion would certainly have hanged up all his dogs: he would never have brought back so many fine horses to the kennel; he would never have gone so often, like a blast, over fields of corn. If such too had been the conduct of all his ancestors, he might truly have boasted at this day, that the antiquity of his family had never been sullied by a trade; a merchant had never been permitted with his whole estate to purchase a room for his picture in the gallery of the Coverleys, or to claim his descent from the maid of honour. But it is very happy for Sir Roger that the merchant paid so dear for his ambition. It is the misfortune of many other gentlemen to turn out of the seats of their ancestors, to make way for such new masters as have been more exact in their accounts than themselves; and certainly he deserves the estate a great deal better who has got it by his industry, than he who has lost it by his negligence.' T. No. 175.] Thursday, September 20, 1711. number of her gazers lessened, resolved not to part with me so, and began to play so many new tricks at her window, that it was impossible for me to forbear observing her. I verily believe she put herself to the expense of a new wax baby on purpose to plague me; she used to dandle and play with this figure as impertinently as if it had been a real child: sometimes she would let fall a glove or a pin-cushion in the street, and shut or open her casement three or four times in a minute. When I had almost weaned myself from this, she came in shift-sleeves, and dressed at the window. I had no way left but to let down my curtains, which I submitted to, though it considerably darkened my room, and was pleased to think that I had at last got the better of her; but was surprised the next morning to hear her talking out of her window quite across the street, with another woman that lodges over me. I am since informed that she made her a visit, and got acquainted with her within three hours after the fall of my window-curtains. 'Sir, I am plagued every moment in the day, one way or other, in my own chambers; and the Jezebel has the satisfaction to know, that though I am not looking at her, I am listening to her impertinent dialogues, that pass over my head. I would immediately change my lodgings, but that I think it might look like a plain confession that I am conquered; and besides this, I am told that most quarters of the town are infested with these creatures. If they are so, I am sure it is such an abuse as a lover of learn I SHALL this day entertain my readers with two or three letters I have received from my correspondents: the first discovers to me a species of females which have hitherto escaped my notice, and is as fol-ing and silence ought to take notice of. lows: "I am, sir, yours, &c.' ing myself observed a nest of Jezebels near the Temple, who make it their diversion that at the same time they may see them to draw up the eyes of young Templars; stumble in an unlucky gutter which runs under the window. 'MR. SPECTATOR,-I am a young gentleman of a competent fortune, and a suffi- that my young student is touched with a I am afraid, by some lines in this letter, cient taste of learning, to spend five or six distemper which he hardly seems to dream hours every day very agreeably among my of, and is too far gone in it to receive adbooks. That I might have nothing to divert vice. However, I shall animadvert in due me from my studies, and to avoid the noise time on the abuse which he mentions, havof coaches and chairmen, I have taken lodgings in a very narrow street, not far from Whitehall; but it is my misfortune to be so posted, that my lodgings are directly opposite to those of a Jezebel. You are to know, sir, that a Jezebel (so called by the neighbourhood from displaying her pernicious charms at her window,) appears constantly dressed at her sash, and has a thousand little tricks and fooleries to attract the eyes of all the idle young fellows in the neighbourhood. I have seen more than six persons at once from their several windows observing the Jezebel I am now complaining of. I at first looked on her myself with the highest contempt, could divert myself with her airs for half an hour, and afterwards take up my Plutarch with great tranquillity of mind; but was a little vexed to find that in less than a month she had considerably stolen upon my time, so that I resolved to look at her no more. But the bel, who, as I suppose, might think it nution to her honour, to have the 'MR. SPECTATOR,-I have lately read the conclusion of your forty-seventh speculation upon butts with great pleasure, and have ever since been thoroughly persuaded that one of those gentlemen is extremely necessary to enliven conversation. I had an entertainment last week upon the water, for a lady to whom I make my addresses, with several of our friends of both sexes. To divert the company in general, and to show my mistress in particular my genius for raillery, I took one of the most celebrated butts in town along with me. It is with the utmost shame and confusion that I must acquaint you with the sequel of my adventure. As soon as we were got into the boat, I played a sentence or two at my butt which I thought very smart, when my | London milliner, I am not able to inform ill genius, who I verily believe inspired you; but among the rest, there was one him purely for my destruction, suggested cherry-coloured riband, consisting of about to him such a reply, as got all the laughter half a dozen yards, made up in the figure on his side. I was dashed at so unexpected of a small head-dress. The aforesaid lady a turn; which the butt perceiving, resolved had the assurance to affirm amidst a circle not to let me recover myself, and pursuing of female inquisitors, who were present at his victory, rallied and tossed me in a most the opening of the box, that this was the unmerciful and barbarous manner until we newest fashion worn at court. Accordingly came to Chelsea. I had some small success the next Sunday, we had several females, while we were eating cheese-cakes; but who came to church with their heads coming home, he renewed his attacks with dressed wholly in ribands, and looked like his former good fortune, and equal diver- so many victims ready to be sacrificed. sion to the whole company. In short, sir, This is still a reigning mode among us. I must ingenuously own that I never was At the same time we have a set of gentleso handled in all my life: and to complete men who take the liberty to appear in all my misfortune, I am since told that the public places without any buttons to their butt, flushed with his late victory, has coats, which they supply with several little made a visit or two to the dear object of silver_hasps, though our freshest advices my wishes, so that I am at once in danger from London make no mention of any such of losing all my pretensions to wit, and fashion; and we are something shy of afmy mistress into the bargain. This, sir, fording matter to the button-makers for a is a true account of my present troubles, second petition. which you are the more obliged to assist me in, as you were yourself in a great measure the cause of them, by recommending to us an instrument, and not instructing us at the same time how to play upon it. "I have been thinking whether it might not be highly convenient, that all butts should wear an inscription affixed to some part of their bodies, showing on which side they are to be come at, and that if any of them are persons of unequal tempers, there should be some method taken to inform the world at what time it is safe to attack them, and when you had best let them alone. But, submitting these matters to your more serious consideration, I am, sir, yours, &c.' I have indeed, seen and heard of several young gentlemen under the same misfortune with my present correspondent. The best rule I can lay down for them to avoid the like calamities for the future, is thoroughly to consider, not only "Whether their companions are weak," but "Whether themselves are wits.' The following letter comes to me from Exeter, and being credibly informed that what it contains is matter of fact, I shall give it my reader as it was sent to me. What I would humbly propose to the public is, that there may be a society erected in London, to consist of the most skilful persons of both sexes, for the inspection of modes and fashions; and that hereafter no person or persons shall presume to appear singularly habited in any part of the country, without a testimonial from the aforesaid society, that their dress is answerable to the mode at London. By this means, sir, we shall know a little whereabout we are. 'If you could bring this matter to bear, you would very much oblige great numbers of your country friends, and among the rest, your very humble servant. X 'JACK MODISH.' No. 176.] Friday, September 21, 1711. A little, pretty, witty, charming she! own way. Exeter, Sept. 7. 'MR. SPECTATOR,-You were pleased in a late speculation to take notice of the in- 'MR. SPECTATOR,-I do not deny but convenience we lie under in the country, in you appear in many of your papers to unnot being able to keep pace with the derstand human life pretty well; but there fashion. But there is another misfor- are very many things which you cannot tune which we are subject to, and is no possibly have a true notion of, in a single less grievous than the former, which has life; these are such as respect the married hitherto escaped your observation. I mean state; otherwise I cannot account for your the having things palmed upon us for Lon-having overlooked a very good sort of peodon fashions, which were never once heard of there. A lady of this place had some time since a box of the newest ribands sent down by the coach. Whether it was her own malicious invention, or the wantonness of a ple, which are commonly called in scorn "the Hen-peckt. You are to understand that I am one of those innocent mortals who suffer derision under that word, for being governed by the best of wives. It would be worth your consideration to enter "All the into the nature of affection itself, and tell | pretty." To this she answers, us according to your philosophy, why it is world but you think I have as much sense that our dears should do what they will as yourself." I repeat to her, "Indeed you with us, shall be froward, ill-natured, as- are pretty. Upon this there is no pasuming, sometimes whine, at others, rail, tience; she will throw down any thing then swoon away, then come to life, have about her, stamp, and pull off her headthe use of speech to the greatest fluency clothes. "Fy, my dear," say I, "how imaginable, and then sink away again, and can a woman of your sense fall into such an all because they fear we do not love them intemperate rage?" This is an argument enough; that is, the poor things love us so that never fails. "Indeed, my dear," says heartily, that they cannot think it possible she, "you make me mad sometimes, so we should be able to love them in so great you do, with the silly way you have of a degree, which makes them take on so. treating me like a pretty idiot." Well, I say, sir, a true good-natured man, whom what have I got by putting her into good rakes and libertines call hen-peckt, shall humour? Nothing, but that I must convince fall into all these different moods with his her of my good opinion by my practice; dear life, and at the same time see they are and then I am to give her possession of my wholly put on; and yet not be hard-hearted little ready-money, and, for a day and a enough to tell the dear good creature that half following, dislike all she dislikes, and she is an hypocrite. extol every thing she approves. I am so exquisitely fond of this darling, that I seldom see any of my friends, am uneasy in all companies until I see her again; and when I come home she is in the dumps, because she says she is sure I came so soon only because I think her handsome. I dare not upon this occasion laugh: but though I am one of the warmest churchmen in the kingdom, I am forced to rail at the times, because she is a violent Whig.. Upon this we talk politics so long, that she is convinced I kiss her for her wisdom. It is a common practice with me to ask her some question concerning the constitution, which she answers me in general out of Harrington's Oceana. Then I commend her strange memory, and her arm is immediately lock 'This sort of good men is very frequent in the populous and wealthy city of London, and is the true hen-peckt man. The kind creature cannot break through his kindnesses so far as to come to an explanation with the tender soul, and therefore goes on to comfort her when nothing ails her, to appease her when she is not angry, and to give her his cash when he knows she does not want it; rather than be uneasy for a whole month, which is computed by hardhearted men the space of time which a froward woman takes to come to herself, if you have courage to stand out. 6 There are indeed several other species of the hen-peckt, and in my opinion they are certainly the best subjects the queen has; and for that reason I take it to be youred in mine. While I keep her in this temduty to keep us above contempt. able woman. 'I do not know whether I make myself understood in the representation of a henpeckt life, but I shall take leave to give you an account of myself, and my own spouse. You are to know that I am reckoned no fool, have on several occasions been tried whether I will take ill-usage, and the event has been to my advantage; and yet there is not such a slave in Turkey as I am to my dear. She has a good share of wit, and is what you call a very pretty agreeI perfectly doat on her, and my affection to her gives me all the anxieties imaginable but that of jealousy. My being thus confident of her, I take, as much as I can judge of my heart, to be the reason, that whatever she does, though it be never so much against my inclination, there is still left something in her manner that is amiable. She will sometimes look at me with an assumed grandeur, and pretend to resent that I have not had respect enough for her opinion in such an instance in company. I cannot but smile at the pretty anger she is in, and then she pretends she is used like a child. In a word, our great debate is, which has the superiority in point of understanding. She is eternally forming an argument of debate; to which I very indolently answer, "Thou art mighty per she plays before me, sometimes dancing in the midst of the room, sometimes striking an air at her spinet, varying her posture and her charms in such a manner that I am in continual pleasure. She will play the fool if I allow her to be wise! but if she suspects I like her for her trifling, she immediately grows grave. 'These are the toils in which I am taken, and I carry off my servitude as well as most men; but my application to you is in behalf of the hen-peckt in general, and I desire a dissertation from you in defence of us. You have, as I am informed, very good authorities in our favour, and hope you will not omit the mention of the renowned Socrates, and his philosophic resignation to his wife Xantippe. This would be a very good office to the world in general, for the henpeckt are powerful in their quality and numbers, not only in cities, but in courts; in the latter they are ever the most obsequious, in the former the most wealthy of all men. When you have considered wedlock thoroughly, you ought to enter into the suburbs of matrimony, and give us an account of the thraldom of kind keepers and irresolute lovers; the keepers who cannot quit their fair ones, though they see their approaching ruin; the lovers who dare not marry, though they know they never it exerts itself promiscuously towards the deserving and undeserving, if it relieves alike the idle and the indigent, if it gives itself up to the first petitioner, and lights upon any one rather by accident than choice, it may pass for an amiable instinct, but must not assume the name of a moral virtue. shall be happy without the mistresses whom | makes no distinction between its objects, if they cannot purchase on other terms. "What will be a greater embellishment to your discourse will be, that you may find instances of the haughty, the proud, the frolic, the stubborn, who are each of them in secret downright slaves to their wives, or mistresses. I must beg of you in the last place to dwell upon this, that the wise and The third trial of good-nature will be the the valiant in all ages have been hen-peckt; examining ourselves, whether or no we are and that the sturdy tempers who are not able to exert it to our own disadvantage, slaves to affection, owe that exemption to and employ it upon proper objects, notwiththeir being enthralled by ambition, avarice, standing any little pain, want or inconveor some meaner passion. I have ten thousand nience, which may arise to ourselves from thousand things more to say, but my wife it. In a word, whether we are willing to sees me writing, and will, according to cus-risk any part of our fortune, or reputation, tom, be consulted, if I do'not seal this immediately. Your's, No. 177.] Friday, September 22, 1711. or health, or ease, for the benefit of mankind. Among all these expressions of goodnature, I shall single out that which goes under the general name of charity, as it consists in relieving the indigent; that being a trial of this kind which offers itself to us almost at all times, and in every place. I should propose it as a rule, to every one who is provided with any competency of fortune more than sufficient for the necesIN one of my last week's papers I treated saries of life, to lay aside a certain portion of good-nature, as it is the effect of constitu- of his income for the use of the poor. This tion; I shall now speak of it as a moral vir- I would look upon as an offering to Him tue. The first may make a man easy in who has a right to the whole, for the use himself and agreeable to others, but implies of those whom in the passage hereafter no merit in him that is possessed of it. A mentioned, he has described as his own reman is no more to be praised upon this ac- presentatives upon earth. At the same count, than because he has a regular pulse, time we should manage our charity with or a good digestion. This good-nature, such prudence and caution, that we may however, in the constitution, which Mr. not hurt our own friends or relations, whilst Dryden somewhere calls a milkiness of we are doing good to those who are strangers blood,' is an admirable ground work for the to us. other. In order, therefore, to try our goodnature, whether it arises from the body or the mind, whether it be founded in the animal or rational part of our nature; in a word, whether it be such as is entitled to any other reward, besides that secret satisfaction and contentment of mind which is essential to it, and the kind reception it procures us in the world, we must examine it by the following rules: First, whether it acts with steadiness and uniformity, in sickness and in health, in prosperity and in adversity; if otherwise, it is to be looked upon as nothing else but an irradiation of the mind from some new supply of spirits, or a more kindly circulation of the blood. Sir Francis Bacon mentions a cunning solicitor, who would never ask a favour of a great man before dinner; but took care to prefer his petition at a time when the party petitioned had his mind free from care, and his appetites in good humour. Such a transient temporary goodnature as this, is not that philanthropy, that love of mankind, which deserves the title of a moral virtue. The next way of a man's bringing his good-nature to the test is, to consider whether it operates according to the rules of reason and duty; for if notwithstanding its general benevolence to mankind, it This may possibly be explained better by an example than by a rule. Eugenius is a man of an universal goodnature, and generous beyond the extent of his fortune; but withal so prudent, in the economy of his affairs, that what goes out in charity is made up by good management. Eugenius has what the world calls two hundred pounds a year; but never values himself above nine-score, as not thinking he has a right to the tenth part, which he always appropriates to charitable uses. To this sum he frequently makes other voluntary additions, insomuch that in a good year, for such he accounts those in which he has been able to make greater bounties than ordinary, he has given above twice that sum to the sickly and indigent. Eugenius prescribes to himself many particular days of fasting and abstinence, in order to increase his private bank of charity, and sets aside what would be the current expenses of those times for the use of the poor. He often goes afoot where his business calls him, and at the end of his walk has given a shilling, which in his ordinary methods of expense would have gone for coach-hire, to the first necessitous person that has fallen in his way. I have known him, when he . has been going to a play or an opera, divert the money which was designed for that purpose, upon an object of charity whom he | of Job. It is the account which that holy has met with in the street; and afterwards man gives of his behaviour in the days of pass his evening in a coffee-house, or at a his prosperity, and if considered only as a friend's fire-side, with much greater satis-human composition, is a finer picture of a faction to himself, than he could have re- charitable and good-natured man than is to ceived from the most exquisite entertain-be met with in any other author. ments of the theatre. By these means he is generous without impoverishing himself, and enjoys his estate by making it the property of others. There are few men so cramped in their private affairs, who may not be charitable after this manner, without any disadvantage to themselves, or prejudice to their families. It is but sometimes sacrificing a diversion or convenience to the poor, and turning the usual course of our expenses into a better channel. This is, I think, not only the most prudent and convenient, but the most meritorious piece of charity, which we can put in practice. By this method, we in some measure share the necessities of the poor at the same time that we relieve them, and make ourselves not only their patrons, but their fellow-sufferers. Sir Thomas Brown, in the last part of his Religio Medici, in which he describes his charity in several heroic instances, and with a noble heat of sentiment, mentions that verse in the Proverbs of Solomon, He that giveth to the poor, lendeth to the Lord: "There is more rhetoric in that one sentence," says he, "than in a library of sermons; and indeed, if those sentences were understood by the reader, with the same emphasis as they are delivered by the author, we needed not those volumes of instructions, but might be honest by an epitome."† "O that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me: When his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness: When the Almighty was yet with me; when my children were about me: When I washed my steps with butter, and the rock poured out rivers of oil. "When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me. Because I delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me, and I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy. I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame: I was a father to the poor, and the cause which I knew not I searched out. Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? was not my soul grieved for the poor? Let me be weighed in an even balance, that God may know mine integrity. If I did despise the cause of my manservant or of my maid-servant when they contended with me, what then shall I do when God riseth up? and when he visiteth, what shall I answer him? Did not he that made me in the womb, make him? and did not one fashion us in the womb? If I have withheld the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail: Or have eaten my morsel myself alone, and the fatherless hath not eaten thereof: This passage in scripture is indeed won-If I have seen any perish for want of clothderfully persuasive; but I think the same thought is carried much farther in the New Testament, where our Saviour tells us in a most pathetic manner, that he shall hereafter regard the clothing of the naked, the feeding of the hungry, and the visiting of the imprisoned, as offices done to himself, and reward them accordingly. Pursuant to those passages in holy scripture, I have somewhere met with the epitaph of a charitable man, which has very much pleased ing, or any poor without covering: If his loins have not blessed me, and if he were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep: If I have lifted up my hand against the fatherless, when I saw my help in the gate; then let mine arm fall from my shoulderblade, and mine arm be broken from the bone. If I have rejoiced at the destruction of him that hated me, or lifted up myself when evil found him: (Neither have I suffered my mouth to sin, by wishing a curse to his soul.) The stranger did not lodge in the street; but I opened my doors to the traveller. If my land cry against me, or that the furrows likewise therefore comSince I am thus insensibly engaged in sa-plain: If I have eaten the fruits thereof cred writ, I cannot forbear making an ex tract of several passages which I have always read with great delight in the book me. I cannot recollect the words, but the sense of it is to this purpose: What I spent I lost; what I possessed is left to others; what I gave away remains with me.§ *Prov. xix. 17. † Brown's Rel. Medici, Part II. Sect. 13. f. 1659, p. 2. Mat. xxv. 31, et seqq. without money, or have caused the owners The epitaph alluded to is (or was) in St. George's No. 178.] Monday, September 24, 1711. Church, at Doncaster in Yorkshire, and runs in old How now, who is heare? That I spent, that I had: Quoth Robertus Byrks, who in this world did reign Comis in uxorem Civil to his wife. Hor. Lib. 2. Ep. ii. 133. I CANNOT defer taking notice of this letter. 'MR. SPECTATOR,-I am but too good a Job xxix. 2. &c. xxx. 25, &c. xxxi. 6, &c. passim. |