Freeport, and all my other friends who are scrupulous to promises of the meanest consideration imaginable, from a habit of virtue that way, have often upbraided me with it. I take shame upon myself for this crime, and more particularly for the greatest I ever committed of the sort, that when as agreeable a company of gentlemen and ladies as ever were got together, and I forsooth, Mr. Spectator, to be of the party with women of merit, like a booby as mistook the time of meeting, and came the night following. I wish every fool who is negligent in this kind, may have as great a loss as I had in this; for the same company will never meet more, but are dispersed into various parts of the world, and I am left under the compunction that I deserve, in so many different places to be called a trifler. may assign this light infidelity. Jack Sippet | great, that they subsist by still promising never keeps the hour he has appointed to on. I have heretofore discoursed of the income to a friend's to dinner; but he is an significant liar, the boaster, and the castleinsignificant fellow, who does it out of builder, and treated them as no ill-designvanity. He could never, he knows, make ing men (though they are to be placed any figure in company, but by giving a little among the frivolous false ones,) but persons disturbance at his entry, and therefore takes who fall into that way purely to recommend care to drop in when he thinks you are just themselves by their vivacities; but indeed I seated. He takes his place after having cannot let heedless promisers, though in discomposed every body, and desires there the most minute circumstances, pass with may be no ceremony; then does he begin to so slight a censure. If a man should take call himself the saddest fellow, in disap- a resolution to pay only sums above a hunpointing so many places as he was invited dred pounds, and yet contract with difto elsewhere. It is the fop's vanity to name ferent people debts of five and ten, how houses of better cheer, and to acquaint you long can we suppose he will keep his credit? that he chose yours out of ten dinners which This man will as long support his good he was obliged to be at that day. The last name in business, as he will in conversation, time I had the fortune to eat with him, he who without difficulty makes assignations was imagining how very fat he should have which he is indifferent whether he keeps been had he eaten all he had ever been in- or not. vited to. But it is impertinent to dwell upon I am the more severe upon this vice, bethe manners of such a wretch as obliges all cause I have been so unfortunate as to be a whom he disappoints, though his circum-very great criminal myself. Sir Andrew stances constrain them to be civil to him. But there are those that every one would be glad to see, who fall into the same detestable habit. It is a merciless thing that any one can be at ease, and suppose a set of people who have a kindness for him, at that moment waiting out of respect to him, and refusing to taste their food or conversation, with the utmost impatience. One of these promisers sometimes shall make his excuses for not coming at all, so late that half the company have only to lament, that they have neglected matters of moment to meet him whom they find a trifler. They immediately repent of the value they had for him; and such treatment repeated, makes company never depend upon his promises any more; so that he often comes at the middle of a meal, where he is secretly slighted by the persons with whom he eats, and cursed by the servants, whose dinner is delayed by his prolonging their master's entertainment. It is wonderful that men guilty this way could never have observed, that the whiling time, and gathering together, and waiting a little before dinner, is the most awkwardly passed away of any part in the four-and-twenty hours. If they did think at all, they would reflect upon their guilt, in lengthening such a suspension of agreeable life. The constant offending this way has, in a degree, an effect upon the honesty of his mind who is guilty of it, as common swearing is a kind of habitual perjury: it makes the soul unattentive to what an oath is, even while it utters it at the lips. Phocion beholding a wordy orator, while he was making a magnificent speech to the people, full of vain promises; Methinks,' said he, 'I am now fixing my eyes upon a cypress tree; it has all the pomp and beauty imaginable in its branches, leaves, and height: but alas! it bears no fruit.' Though the expectation which is raised by impertinent promises is thus barren, their confidence, even after failures, is so was, This fault is sometimes to be accounted for, when desirable people are fearful of appearing precise and reserved by denials; but they will find the apprehension of that imputation will betray them into a childish impotence of mind, and make them promise all who are so kind to ask it of them. This leads such soft creatures into the misfortune of seeming to return overtures of good-will with ingratitude. The first steps in the breach of a man's integrity are much more important than men are aware of. The man who scruples not breaking his word in little things, would not suffer in his own conscience so great pain for failures of consequence, as he who thinks every little offence against truth and justice a disparagement. We should not make any thing we ourselves disapprove habitual to us, if we would be sure of our integrity. I remember a falsehood of the trivial sort, though not in relation to assignations, that exposed a man to a very uneasy adventure. Will Trap and Jack Stint were chamber-fellows in the Inner-Temple about twenty-five years ago. They one night sat |ings many descriptions given of ill persons, and not any direct encomium made of those who are good. When I was convinced of this error, I could not but immediately call to mind several of the fair sex of my acquaintance, whose characters deserve to be transmitted to posterity in writings which will long outlive mine. But I do not think that a reason why I should not give them their place in my diurnal as long as it will last. For the service thereof of my female readers, I shall single out some characters of maids, wives, and widows which deserve the imitation of the sex. She who shall roines shall be the amiable Fidelia. in the pit together at a comedy, where they both observed and liked the same young woman in the boxes. Their kindness for her entered both hearts deeper than they imagined. Stint had a good faculty in writing letters of love, and made his address privately that way; while Trap proceeded in the ordinary course, by money and her waiting-maid. The lady gave them both encouragement, received Trap into the utmost favour, answering at the same time Stint's letters, and giving him appointments at third places. Trap began to suspect the epistolary correspondence of his friend, and discovered also that Stint opened all his let-lead this small illustrious number of heters which came to their common lodgings, in order to form his own assignations. After much anxiety and restlessness, Trap came to a resolution, which he thought would break off their commerce with one another without any hazardous explanation. He therefore writ a letter in a feigned hand to Mr. Trap at his chambers in the Temple. Stint, according to custom, seized and opened it, and was not a little surprised to find the inside directed to himself, when, with great perturbation of spirit, he read as follows: Before I enter upon the particular parts of her character, it is necessary to preface, that she is the only child of a decrepid father, whose life is bound up in hers. This gentleman has used Fidelia from her cradle with all the tenderness imaginable, and has viewed her growing perfections with the partiality of a parent, that soon thought her accomplished above the children of all other men, but never thought she was come to the utmost improvement of which she herself was capable. This fondness has had MR. STINT,-You have gained a slight very happy effects upon his own happiness; satisfaction at the expense of doing a very for she reads, she dances, she sings, uses heinous crime. At the price of a faithful her spinet and lute to the utmost perfection; friend you have obtained an inconstant mis- and the lady's use of all these excellences tress. I rejoice in this expedient I have is to divert the old man in his easy chair, thought of to break my mind to you, and when he is out of the pangs of a chronical tell you, you are a base fellow, by a means distemper. Fidelia is now in the twentywhich does not expose you to the affront third year of her age; but the application except you deserve it. of many lovers, her vigorous time of life, I know, sir, as criminal as you are, you have still shame her quick sense of all that is truly gallant enough to avenge yourself against the hardi- and elegant in the enjoyment of a plentiful ness of any one that should publicly tell fortune, are not able to draw her from the you of it. I therefore, who have received side of her good old father. Certain it is, so many secret hurts from you, shall take that there is no kind of affection so pure satisfaction with safety to myself. I call and angelic as that of a father to a daughter. you base, and you must bear it, or acknow- He beholds her both with and without reledge it; I triumph over you that you can-gard to her sex. In love to our wives there not come at me; nor do I think it dishonourable to come in armour to assault him, who was in ambuscade when he wounded Mart. iii. 68. A book the chastest matron may perusè. is desire, to our sons there is ambition; but in that to our daughters, there is something which there are no words to express. Her life is designed wholly domestic, and she is so ready a friend and companion, that every thing that passes about a man is accompanied with the idea of her presence. Her sex also is naturally so much exposed to hazard, both as to fortune and innocence, that there is perhaps a new cause of fondness arising from that consideration also. None but fathers can have a true sense of these sort of pleasures and sensations; but my familiarity with the father of Fidelia, makes me let drop the words which I have heard him speak, and observe upon his tenderness towards her. Fidelia, on her part, as I was going to say, as accomplished as she is, with her beauty, WHEN I reflect upon my labours for the wit, air, and mien, employs her whole public, I cannot but observe, that part of time in care and attendance upon her fathe species, of which I profess myself a ther. How have I been charmed to see one friend and guardian, is sometimes treated of the most beautiful women the age has with severity; that is, there are in my writ-produced, on her knees, helping on an old astonished to hear that, in those intervals when the old gentleman is at ease, and can bear company, there are at his house, in the most regular order, assemblies of peoconversation without mention of the faults of the absent, benevolence between men and women without passion, and the highest subjects of morality treated of as natural and accidental discourse; all which is owing to the genius of Fidelia; who at once makes her father's way to another world easy, and herself capable of being an honour to his name in this. man's slipper! Her filial regard to him is what she makes her diversion, her busitness, and her glory. When she was asked by a friend of her deceased mother to admit of the courtship of her son, she answer-ple of the highest merit; where there is ed that she had a great respect and gratitude to her for the overture in behalf of one so dear to her, but that during her father's life she would admit into her heart no value for any thing that should interfere with her endeavour to make his remains of life as happy and easy as could be expected in his circumstances. The lady admonished her of the prime of life with a smile; which Fidelia answered with a frankness that al'MR. SPECTATOR,-I was the other day ways attends unfeigned virtue: 'It is true, at the Bear-garden, in hopes to have seen madam, there are to be sure very great your short face: but not being so fortunate, satisfactions to be expected in the com- I must tell you, by way of letter, that there merce of a man of honour whom one tender- is a mystery among the gladiators which ly loves; but I find so much satisfaction, in has escaped your spectatorial penetration. the reflection, how much I mitigate a good For, being in a box at an ale-house near man's pains, whose welfare depends upon that renowned seat of honour above-menmy assiduity about him, that I willingly ex- tioned, I overheard two masters of the clude the loose gratifications of passion for science agreeing to quarrel on the next opthe solid reflections of duty. I know not portunity. This was to happen in a comwhether any man's wife would be allowed, pany of a set of the fraternity of basketand (what I still more fear) I know not hilts, who were to meet that evening. whether I, a wife, should be willing to be so When this was settled, one asked the officious as I am at present about my pa-other, "Will you give cuts or receive?" rent.' The happy father has her declaration The other answered, "Receive." It was that she will not marry during his life, and replied, "Are you a passionate man?” the pleasure of seeing that resolution not "No, provided you cut no more nor no uneasy to her. Were one to paint filial affec-deeper than we agree. I thought it my tion in its utmost beauty, he could not have duty to acquaint you with this, that the a more lively idea of it than in beholding people may not pay their money for fightFidelia serving her father at his hours of ing, and be cheated. Your humble serrising, meals, and rest. When the general crowd of female youth are consulting their glasses, preparing for balls, assemblies, or plays; for a young vant, T. SCABBARD RUSTY.' lady, who could be regarded among the No. 450.] Wednesday, August 6, 1712. foremost in those places, either for her person, wit, fortune, or conversation, and yet contemn all these entertainments, to sweeten the heavy hours of a decrepid parent, is a resignation truly heroic. Fidelia performs the duty of a nurse with all the beauty of a bride; nor does she neglect her person, because of her attendance on him, when he is too ill to receive company, to whom she may make an appearance. -Quærenda pecunia primum, Hor. Ep. i. Lib. 1. 53. -Get money, money still; And then let virtue follow, if she will.-Pope. 'MR. SPECTATOR,-All men through different paths, make at the same common thing, money: and it is to her we owe the politician, the merchant, and the lawyer; nay, to be free with you, I believe to that also we are beholden for our Spectator. I Fidelia, who gives him up her youth, am apt to think, that could we look into does not think it any great sacrifice to add our own hearts, we should see money ento it the spoiling of her dress. Her care graved in them in more lively and moving and exactness in her habit convince her fa- characters than self-preservation; for who ther of the alacrity of her mind; and she can reflect upon the merchant hoisting sail has of all women the best foundation for in a doubtful pursuit of her, and all manaffecting the praise of a seeming negligence. kind sacrificing their quiet to her, but must What adds to the entertainment of the perceive that the characters of self-presergood old man is, that Fidelia, where merit vation (which were doubtless originally the and fortune cannot be overlooked by episto- brightest) are sullied, if not wholly defaced; lary lovers, reads over the accounts of her and that those of money (which at first conquests, plays on her spinet the gayest was only valuable as a mean to security) airs (and while she is doing so you would are of late so brightened, that the characthink her formed only for gallantry) to in-ters of self-preservation, like a less light timate to him the pleasures she despises for his sake. Those who think themselves the pattern of good-breeding and gallantry would be set by a greater, are become almost imperceptible? Thus has money got the upperhand of what all mankind formerly thought most dear, viz, security: and I wish I could say she had here put a stop to her victo- | men do their wives and children, and thereries; but, alas! common honesty fell a sa- fore could not resist the first impulses of crifice to her. This is the way scholastic nature on so wounding a loss; but I quickly men talk of the greatest good in the world: roused myself, and found means to allebut I, a tradesman, shall give you another viate, and at last conquer, my affliction, by account of this matter in the plain narra- reflecting how that she and her children tive of my own life. I think it proper, in | having been no great expense to me, the the first place, to acquaint my readers, best part of her fortune was still left; that that since my setting out in the world, my charge being reduced to myself, a jourwhich was in the year 1660, I never wanted neyman, and a maid, I might live far money, having begun with an indifferent cheaper than before; and that being now a good stock in the tobacco-trade, to which I childless widower, I might perhaps marry was bred; and by the continual successes it a no less deserving woman, and with a has pleased Providence to bless my endea- much better fortune than she brought, vours with, I am at last arrived at what which was but 800l. And, to convince my they call a plum. To uphold my discourse readers that such considerations as these in the manner of your wits or philosophers, were proper and apt to produce such an by speaking fine things, or drawing infer- affect, I remember it was the constant obences, as they pretend, from the nature of servation at that deplorable time, when so the subject, I account it vain; having never many hundreds were swept away daily, found any thing in the writings of such men, that the rich ever bore the loss of their fathat did not savour more of the invention milies and relations far better than the poor; of the brain, or what is styled speculation, the latter having little or nothing beforethan of sound judgment or profitable ob- hand, and living from hand to mouth, servation. I will readily grant indeed, that placed the whole comfort and satisfaction there is what the wits call natural in their of their lives in their wives and children, talk; which is the utmost those curious au- and were therefore inconsolable. thors can assume to themselves, and is indeed all they endeavour at, for they are but lamentable teachers. And what, I pray, is natural? That which is pleasing and easy. -And what are pleasing and easy? Forsooth, a new thought, or conceit dressed up in smooth quaint language, to make you smile and wag your head, as being what you never imagined before, and yet wonder why you had not; mere frothy amusements, fit only for boys or silly women to be caught with. "The following year happened the fire: at which time, by good providence, it was my fortune to have converted the greatest part of my effects into ready money, on the prospect of an extraordinary advantage which I was preparing to lay hold on. This calamity was very terrible and astonishing, the fury of the flames being such, that whole streets, at several distant places, were destroyed at one and the same time, so that (as it is well known) almost all our citizens were burnt out of what they had. 'It is not my present intention to instruct But what did I then do? I did not stand my readers in the method of acquiring gazing on the ruins of our noble metropolis; riches; that may be the work of another I did not shake my head, wring my hands, essay; but to exhibit the real and solid ad- sigh and shed tears; I considered with myvantages I have found by them in my long self what could this avail; I fell a plodding and manifold experience; nor yet all the ad- what advantages might be made of the vantages of so worthy and valuable a bless-ready cash I had; and immediately being, (for who does not know or imagine the comforts of being warm or living at ease, and that power and pre-eminence are their inseparable attendants?) but only to instance the great supports they afford us under the severest calamities and misfortune; to show that the love of them is a special antidote against immorality and vice; and that the same does likewise naturally dispose men to actions of piety and devotion. All which I can make out by my own experience, who think myself no ways particular from the rest of mankind, nor better nor worse by nature than generally other men are. In the year 1665, when the sickness was, I lost by it my wife and two children, which were all my stock. Probably I might have had more, considering I was married between four and five years; but finding her to be a teeming woman, I was careful, as having then little above a brace of thousand pounds to carry on my trade and main a family with. "I loved them as usually thought myself that wonderful pennyworths might be bought of the goods that were saved out of the fire. In short, with about 2000l. and a little credit, I bought as much tobacco as raised my estate to the value of 10,000l. I then “looked on the ashes of our city, and the misery of its late inhabitants, as an effect of the just wrath and indignation of heaven towards a sinful and perverse people." After this I married again; and that wife dying, I took another; but both proved to be idle baggages: the first gave me a great deal of plague and vexation by her extravagances, and I became one of the by-words of the city. I knew it would be to no manner of purpose to go about to curb the fancies and inclinations of women, which fly out the more for being restrained; but what I could I did; I watched her narrowly, and by good luck found her in the embraces (for which I had two witnesses with me) of a wealthy spark of the court end of the town; of whom I recovered 15,000l. which made me amends for what she had idly squandered, and put a silence to all my neighbours, taking off my reproach by the gain they saw I had by it. The last died about two years after I married her, in labour of three children. I conjecture they were begot by a country kinsman of hers, whom, at her recommendation, I took into my family, and gave wages to as a journeyman. What this creature expended in delicacies and high diet with her kinsman (as well as I could compute by the poulterer's, fishmonger's, and grocer's bills,) amounted in the said two years to one hundred eighty-six pounds four shillings and five-pence half-penny. The fine apparel, bracelets, lockets, and treats, &c. of the other, according to the best calculation, came, in three years and about three quarters, to seven hundred-forty four pounds seven shillings and nine pence. After this I resolved never to marry more, and found I had been a gainer by my marriages, and the damages granted me for the abuses of my bed (all charges deducted) eight thousand three hundred pounds, within a trifle. 'I come now to show the good effects of the love of money on the lives of men, towards rendering them honest, sober, and religious. When I was a young man, I had a mind to make the best of my wits, and over-reached a country chap in a parcel of unsound goods; to whom, upon his upbraiding, and threatening to expose me for it, I returned the equivalent of his loss; and upon his good advice, wherein he clearly demonstrated the folly of such artifices, enough to employ his thoughts on every moment of the day; so that I cannot call to mind, that in all the time I was a husband, which, off and on, was above twelve years, I ever once thought of my wives but in bed. And, lastly, for religion, I have ever been a constant churchman, both forenoons and afternoons on Sundays, never forgetting to be thankful for any gain or advantage I had had that day; and on Saturday nights, upon casting up my accounts, I always was grateful for the sum of my week's profits, and at Christmas for that of the whole year. It is true, perhaps, that my devotion has not been the most fervent; which, I think, ought to be imputed to the evenness and sedateness of my temper, which never would admit of any impetuosities of any sort: and I can remember, that in my youth and prime of manhood, when my blood ran brisker, I took greater pleasure in religious exercises than at present, or many years past, and that my devotion sensibly declined as age, which is dull and unwieldy, came upon me. 'I have, I hope, here proved, that the love of money prevents all immorality and vice; which if you will not allow, you must, that the pursuit of it obliges men to the same kind of life as they would follow if they were really virtuous; which is all I have to say at present, only recommending to you, that you would think of it, and turn ready wit into ready money as fast as you can. I conclude, your servant, T. 'EPHRAIM WEED.' Jam sævus apertam In rabiam cæpit verti jocus, et per honestas Hor. Ep. i. Lib. 2. 148. -Times corrupt, and nature ill inclin'd, which can never end but in shame, and the No. 451.] Thursday, August 7, 1712. ruin of all correspondence, I never after transgressed. Can your courtiers, who take bribes, or your lawyers or physicians in their practice, or even the divines who intermeddle in worldly affairs, boast of making but one slip in their lives, and of such a thorough and lasting reformation? Since my coming into the world I do not remember I was ever overtaken in drink, save nine times, once at the christening of my first child, thrice at our city feasts, and five times at driving of bargains. My reformation I can attribute to nothing so much as the love and esteem of money, for I found myself to be extravagant in my drink, and apt to turn projector, and make rash bargains. As for women, I never knew any except my wives: for my reader must know, and it is what he may confide in as an excellent recipe, that the love of business and money is the greatest mortifier of inordinate desires imaginable, as employing the mind continually in the careful oversight of what one has in the eager quest after more, in looking after the negligences and deceits of servants, in the due entering and stating of accounts, in hunting after chaps, and in the exact knowledge of the state of markets; which things whoever thoroughly attends to, will find enough and THERE is nothing so scandalous to a government, and detestable in the eyes of all good men, as defamatory papers and pamphlets; but at the same time there is nothing so difficult to tame as a satirical author. An angry writer who cannot appear in print, naturally vents his spleen in libels and lampoons. A gay old woman, says the fable, seeing all her wrinkles represented in a large looking-glass, threw it upon the ground in a passion, and broke it in a thousand pieces; but as she was afterwards surveying the fragments with a spiteful kind of pleasure, she could not forbear uttering herself in the following soliloquy: What have I got by this revengeful blow of mine? I have only multiplied my deformity, and see a hundred ugly faces, where before I saw but one.' It has been proposed, to oblige every person that writes a book, or a paper, to swear himself the author of it, and enter |