sonable as to afford me a moderate share out of any considerable estate, profit or emolument, which I shall discover to them. I interpret to the poor for nothing, on condition that their names may be inserted in public advertisements, to attest the truth of such my interpretations. As for people of quality, or others who are indisposed, and do not care to come in person, I can interpret their dreams by seeing their water. I set aside one day in the week for lovers; and interpret by the great for any gentlewoman who is turned of sixty, after the rate of a half a crown per week, with the usual allowances for good luck. I have several rooms and, apartments fitted up at reasonable rates, for such as have not conveniencies for dreaming at their own houses. 'TITUS TROPHONIUS.' 'N. B. I am not dumb.' 0. No. 506. FRIDAY, OCT. 10, 1712. Candida perpetuo reside, concordia, lecto, THE following essay is written by the gentleman to whom the world is obliged for those several excellent discourses which have been marked with the letter X. I HAVE Somewhere met with a fable that made Wealth the father of Love. It is certain that a mind ought at least to be free from the apprehensions of want and poverty, before it can fully attend to all the softnesses and endearments of this passion; notwithstanding, we see multitudes of married people, who are utter strangers to this delightful passion amidst all the affluence of the most plentiful fortunes. It is not sufficient to make a marriage happy, that the humours of two people should be alike. I could instance an hundred pair, who have not the least sentiment of love remaining for one another, yet are so like in their humours, that, if they were not already married, the whole world would design them for man and wife. The spirit of love has something so extremely fine in it, that it is very often disturbed and lost, by some little accidents, which the careless and unpolite never attend to, until it is gone past recovery. Nothing has more contributed to banish it from a married state, than too great a familiarity, and laying aside the common rules of decency. Though I could give instances of this in several particulars, I shall only mention that of dress. The beaux and belles about town, who dress purely to catch one another, think there is no further occasion for the bait, when their first design has succeeded. But besides the too common fault in point of neatness, there are several others which I do not remember to have seen touched upon, but in one of our modern come> * dies, where a French woman offering to undress and dress herself before the lover of the play, and assuring his mistress that it was very usual in France, the lady tells her that is a secret in dress she never knew before, and that she was so unpolished an English woman, as to resolve never to learn even to dress before her husband. There is something so gross in the carriage of some wives, that they lose their husband's hearts for faults, which, if a man has either good-nature or good-breeding, he knows not how to tell them of. I am afraid, indeed, the ladies are generally, most faulty in this particular: who, at their first giving into love, find the way so smooth and pleasant, that they fancy it is scarce possible to be tired in it. There is so much nicety and discretion required to keep love alive after marriage, and make conversation still new and agreeable after twenty or thirty years, that I know nothing which seems readily to promise it, but an earnest endeavour to please on both sides, and superior good sense on the part of the man. By a man of sense I mean one acquainted with business and letters. A woman very much settles her esteem for a man, according to the figure he makes in the world, and the character he bears among his own sex. As learning is the chief advantage we have over them, it is, methinks, as scandalous and inexcusable for a man of fortune to be illiterate, as for a woman not to know how to behave herself on the most ordinary occasions. It is this which sets the two sexes at the greatest distance; a woman is vexed and surprised, to find nothing more in * The Funeral, or Grief Alamode, by Steele. 1 the conversation of a man, than in the common tattle of her own sex. Some small engagement at least in business not only sets a man's talents in the fairest light, and allots him a part to act in which a wife cannot well intermeddle, but gives frequent occasion for those little absences, which, whatever seeming uneasiness they may give, are some of the best preservatives of love and desire. The fair sex are so conscious to themselves, that they have nothing in them which can deserve entirely to engross the whole man, that they heartily despise one, who, to use their own expression, is always hanging at their apron-strings. Lætitia is pretty, modest, tender, and has sense enough; she married Erastus, who is in a post of some business, and has a general taste in most parts of polite learning. Lætitia, wherever she visits, has the pleasure to hear of something which was handsomely said or done by Erastus. Erastus, since his marriage, was more gay in his dress than ever, and in all companies is as complaisant to Lætitia as to any other lady. I have seen him give her her fan when it has dropped, with all the gallantry of a lover. When they take the air together, Erastus is continually improving her thoughts, and, with a turn of wit and spirit which is peculiar to him, giving her an insight into things she had no notions of before. Lætitia is transported at having a new world thus opened to her, and hangs upon the man that gives her such agreeable informations. Erastus has carried this point still further, as he makes her daily not only more fond of him, but infinitely more satisfied with herself. Erastus finds a justness or beauty in whatever she says or observes, that Lætitia herself was not aware of; and by his as sistance she has discovered an hundred good qualities and accomplishments, in herself, which she never before once dreamed of. Erastus, with the most artful complaisance in the world, by sev. eral remote hints, finds the means to make her say or propose almost whatever he has a mind to, which he always receives as her own discovery, and gives her all the reputation of it. Erastus has a perfect taste in painting, and carried Lætitia with him the other day to see a collection of pictures. I sometimes visit this happy couple. As we were last week walking in the long gallery before dinner, I have lately laid out some money in paintings,' says Erastus; 'I bought that Venus and Adonis purely upon Lætitia's judgment; it cost me threescore guineas, and I was this morning offered an hundred for it.' I turned towards Lætitia, and saw her cheeks glow with pleasure, while at the same time she cast a look upon Erastus, the most tender and affectionate I ever beheld. Flavilla married Tom Tawdry; she was taken with his laced coat and rich sword-knot; she has the mortification to see Tom despised by all the worthy part of his own sex. Tom has nothing to do after dinner, but to determine whether he will pare his nails at St. James's, White's, or his own house. He has said nothing to Flavilla since they were married which she might not have heard as well from her own woman, He however takes great care to keep up the saucy ill-natured authority of a husband. Whatever Flavilla happens to assert, Tom immediately contradicts with an oath by way of preface, and, 'My dear, I must tell you you talk most confoundedly silly.' Flavilla had a heart naturally as well disposed for all the tenderness of love as that of Lætetia; but as |