and while in the profecution of his studies he fuffers the wearinefs of labour, is fubject by his courfe of life to the maladies of idleness.

It was perhaps from the obfervation of this great omiffion in those who are employed about intellectual objects, that Locke has, in his fyftem of education, fo warmly urged the neceffity of a manual trade to men of all ranks and professions, that when the mind is weary with its proper labours, it may be relaxed by a flighter attention to fome mechanical operation; and while the vital functions are refufcitated and awakened by vigorous motion, the understanding may be retained from that vagrance and diffipation by which it too often relieves itself, after a long intenseness of thought, unless fome allurement be prefented that may engage attention without anxiety.

There is fo little reafon for expecting any frequent conformity to Locke's precept, that it is not neceffary to inquire whether the practice of manual arts might not give occafion to petty emulation, and trivial ambition; and whether, if our divines and phyficians were taught the lathe and the chizzel, they might not think more of their tools than their books; as Nero neglected the care of his empire for his chariot and his fiddle. It is cer

tainly dangerous to be too much pleased with little things; but what is there which may not be perverted? Let us, however, remember how much worfe employment might have been found for those hours, which a manual occupation appears to engrofs; let us compute the profit with the lofs; and when we reflect how often a genius is allured from his studies, confider, that perhaps by the fame

;

attractions

attractions he is sometimes with-held from debauchery, and recalled from malice, from ambition, from envy, and from lust.

I have always admired the wisdom of those by whom our female education was instituted, for having contrived, that every woman of whatever condition fhould be taught fome arts of manufac ture, by which the vacuities of reclufe and domeftic leifure may always be filled up; fince the weakness of their fex, and the general system of life, exclude them from many employments which, by diverfifying the circumstances of men, preferve them from being cankered by the rust of their own thoughts. I know not how much of the virtue and happiness of the world may be the confequence of this judicious regulation. Perhaps, the most powerful fancy might be unable to figure the confusion and slaughter that would be produced by fa many piercing eyes and vivid understandings, turned loose at once upon mankind, with no other bufinefs than to fparkle and intrigue, to perplex and to destroy.

For my part, whenever chance brings within my obfervation a knot of miffes bufy at their needles, I confider myself as in the school of virtue; and, though I have no extraordinary skill in plain-work or embroidery, look upon their operations with, at least, as much fatisfaction as their governefs; because I regard them as providing a fecurity against the most dangerous enfnarers of the foul, by enabling themselves to exclude idleness from their solitary moments, and with idlenefs her attendant train of paffions, fancies, and chimeras, fears, forrows, and defires. Ovid and

Cervantes

Cervantes inform, that love has no power but over those whom he catches unemployed; and Hector, in the Iliad, when he fees Andromache overwhelmed with terrors, fends her for confolation to the loom and the diftaff.

It is certain that any wild wish or vain imagination never takes fuch firm poffeffion of the mind, as when it is found empty and unoccupied for the old Peripatetic principle, That nature abhors a vacuum, may be properly applied to the intellect : it will embrace any thing, however abfurd or criminal, rather than be wholly without an object. Perhaps every man may date the predominance of thofe defires that difturb his life and contaminate his confcience, from fome unhappy hour when too much leisure expofed him to their incurfions; for he has lived with little obfervation either on himfelf or others, who does not know that to be idle is to be vicious.

THE

RAMBLER.

NUMBER LXXXVI.

LONDON, Saturday, January 12. 1751.

Rectum numerum digitis callemus et aure.

HOR.

I

T has been obferved by one of the ancients, that the burthen of government is increased upon princes by the virtues of their immediate predeceffors. It is indeed always dangerous to be placed in a state of unavoidable comparison with excellence; and the danger is ftill greater when that excellence is confecrated by death, when envy and interest cease to act against it, and thofe pafVOL. IV.

H

fions