PERDITA.

No. 43.] SATURDAY, FEB. 10, 1759.

set her above them; yet I am afraid the most in your power to be a better friend than her charitable of them will hardly think it possible father to for me to be daily spectatress of his vices without tacitly allowing them, and at last consenting to them, as the eye of the frighted infant is, by degrees reconciled to the darkness of which at first it was afraid. It is a common opinion, he himself must very well know, that vices, like diseases, are often hereditary; and that the property of the one is to infect the manners, as the other poisons the springs of life.

THE natural advantages which arise from the position of the earth which we inhabit, with respect to the other planets, afford much employment to mathematical speculation, by which it has been discovered, that no other conformation of the system could have given such commodious distributions of light and heat, or imparted fertility and pleasure to so great a part of a revolving sphere.

It may be, perhaps, observed by the moralist, with equal reason, that our globe seems particularly fitted for the residence of a being, placed here only for a short time, whose task is, to advance himself to a higher and happier state of existence, by unremitted vigilance of caution, and activity of virtue.

Yet this though bad, is not the worst; my father deceives himself the hopes of the very child he has brought into the world; he suffers his house to be the seat of drunkenness, riot, and irreligion who seduces, almost in my sight, the menial servant, converses with the prostitute, and corrupts the wife! Thus I, who from my earliest dawn of reason was taught to think that at my approach every eye sparkled with pleasure, or was dejected as conscious of superior charms, am excluded from society, through fear lest I should partake, if not of The duties required of a man are such as humy father's crimes, at least of his reproach. man nature does not willingly perform, and Is a parent, who is so little solicitous for the such as those are inclined to delay who yet inwelfare of a child, better than a pirate who tend some time to fufil them. It was thereturns a wretch adrift in a boat at sea, without fore necessary that this universal reluctance a star to steer by, or an anchor to hold it fast? should be conteracted, and the drowsiness of Am I not to lay all my miseries at those doors hesitation wakened into resolve; that the danwhich ought to have opened only for my protec-ger of procrastination should be always in tion? And if doomed to add at last one more view, and the fallacies of security be hourly to the number of those wretches whom neither detected. the world nor its law befriends, may I not justly say that I have been awed by a parent into ruin? But though a parent's power is screened from insult and violation by the very words of Heaven, yet surely no laws, divine or human, forbid me to remove myself from the malignant shade of a plant that poisons all around it, blasts the bloom of youth, checks its improvements, and makes all its flowerets fade; The day has been considered as an image of but to whom can the wretched, can the depen- the year and the year as the representation of dent fly? For me to fly a father's house, is to life. The morning answers to the spring, and be a beggar; I have only one comforter amidst the spring to childhood and youth; the noon my anxieties, a pious relation, who bids me corresponds to the summer, and the summer to appeal to Heaven for a witness of my just in- the strength of manhood. The evening is an tentions, fly as a deserted wretch to its protec-emblem of autumn, and autumn of declining life. tion; and being asked who my father is, point, like the ancient philosopher, with my finger to the heavens.

To this end all the appearances of nature uniformly conspire. Whatever we see on every side reminds us of the lapse of time and the flux of life. The day and night succeed each other, the rotation of seasons diversifies the year, the sun rises, attains the meridian, declines and sets; and the moon every night changes its form.

The night with its silence and darkness shows the winter, in which all the powers of vegetation are benumbed; and the winter points out the time when life shall cease, with its hopes and pleasures.

The hope in which I write this, is, that you will give it a place in your paper; and as your essays sometimes find their way into the coun- He that is carried forward, however swiftly, try, that my father may read my story there; by a motion equable and easy, perceives not the and, if not for his own sake yet for mine, spare change of place but by the variation of obto perpetuate that worst of calamities to me,jects. If the wheel of life, which rolls thus the loss of character, from which all his dis-silently along, passed on through undistinguishsimulation has not been able to rescue himself. able uniformity, we should never mark its apTell the world, Sir, that it is possible for virtue proaches to the end of the course. If one hour to keep its throne unshaken without any other were like another; if the passage of the sun did guard than itself; that it is possible to maintain not show that the day is wasting; if the change that purity of thought so necessary to the com- of seasons did not impress upon us the flight of pletion of human excellence even in the midst the year; quantities of duration equal to days of temptations; when they have no friend and years would glide unobserved. If the parts within, nor are assisted by the voluntary indul- of time were not variously coloured, we should gence of vicious thoughts. never discern their departure or succession, but should live thoughtless of the past, and careless of the future, without will, and perhaps without power, to compute the periods of life, or to

If the insertion of a story like this does not break in on the plan of your paper, you have it

395

THE IDLER.

compare the time which is already lost with things, is far the most pleasing part of mental that which may probably remain.

But the course of time is so visibly marked, that it is observed even by the birds of passage, and by nations who have raised their minds very little above animal instinct; there are human beings whose language does not supply them with words by which they can number five, but I have read of none that have not names for day and night, for summer and winter.

Yet it is certain that these admonitions of nature, however forcible, however importunate, are too often vain; and that many who mark with such accuracy the course of time, appear to have little sensibility of the decline of life. Every man has something to do which he neglects; every man has faults to conquer which he delays to combat.

occupation. We are naturally delighted with novelty, and there is a time when all that we see is new. When first we enter into the world, whithersoever we turn our eyes, they meet Knowledge with Pleasure at her side; every diversity of nature pours ideas in upon the soul; neither search nor labour are necessary; we have nothing more to do than to open our eyes, and curiosity is gratified.

Much of the pleasure which the first survey of the world affords, is exhausted before we are conscious of our own felicity, or able to compare our condition with some other possible state. We have therefore few traces of the joy of our earliest discoveries; yet we all remember a time when nature had so many untasted gratifications, that every excursion gave delight which can now be found no longer, when the noise of a torrent, the rustle of a wood, the song of birds, or the play of lambs, had power to fill the attention, and suspend all perception of the course of time.

So little do we accustom ourselves to consider the effects of time, that things necessary and certain often surprise us like unexpected contingencies. We leave the beauty in her bloom, But these easy pleasures are soon at end; we and, after an absence of twenty years, wonder, at our return, to find her faded. We meet have seen in a very little time so much, that we those whom we left children, and can scarcely call out for new objects of observation, and en persuade ourselves to treat them as men. The deavour to find variety in books and life. But traveller visits in age those countries through study is laborious, and not always satisfactory; which he rambled in his youth, and hopes for and conversation has its pains as well as plea merriment at the old place. The man of busi-sures; we are willing to learn but not willwe are pained by ignorance, ness wearied with unsatisfactory prosperity, ing to be taught; retires to the town of his nativity, and expects but pained yet more by another's knowledge. From the vexation of pupilage men common to play away the last years with the companions of his childhood, and recover youth in the ly set themselves free about the middle of life, by shutting up the avenues of intelligence, and fields where he once was young. resolving to rest in their present state; and they, whose ardour of inquiry continues longer, find themselves insensibly forsaken by their inAs every man advances in life, the structors. proportion between those that are younger and that are older than himself, is continually changing; and he that has lived half a century finds few that do not require from him that information which he once expected from those

From this inattention, so general and so mischievous, let it be every man's study to exempt himself. Let him that desires to see others happy, inake haste to give while his gift can be enjoyed, and remember that every moment of delay takes away something from the value of his benefaction. And let him, who purposes his own happiness, reflect, that while he forms his purpose the day rolls on, and "the night cometh when no man can work!"

No. 44.] SATURDAY, FEB. 17, 1759.

that went before him.

Then it is that the magazines of memory are opened, and the stores of accumulated knowledge are displayed by vanity or benevolence, or in honest commerce of mutual interest. MEMORY is, among the faculties of the human Every man wants others, and is therefore glad mind, that of which we make the most frequent when he is wanted by them. And as few men use, or rather that of which the agency is in-will endure the labour of intense meditation cessant or perpetual. Memory is the primary without necessity, he that has learned enough and fundamental power, without which there for his profit or his honour, seldom endeavours could be no other intellectual operation. Judg-after further acquisitions. The pleasure of recollecting speculative noment and ratiocination suppose something already known, and draw their decisions only tions would not be much less than that of gainfrom experience. Imagination selects ideas ing them, if they could be kept pure and from the treasures of remembrance, and pro- unmingled with the passages of life; but such duces novelty only by varied combinations. is the necessary concatention of our thoughts, We do not even form conjectures of distant, or that good and evil are linked together, and no anticipations, of future events, but by conclud-pleasure recurs but associated with pain. Every ing what is possible from what is past.

The two offices of memory are collection and distribution; by one images are accumulated, and by the other produced for use. Collection is always the employment of our first years; and distribution commonly that of our advanc

ed age.

To collect and reposit the various forms of

revived idea reminds us of a time, when something was enjoyed that is now lost, when some hope was yet not blasted, when some purpose had yet not languished into sluggishness or indifference.

Whether it be that life has more vexations than comforts, or, what is in the event just the same, that evil makes deeper impression than

good, it is certain that no man can review the time past without heaviness of heart. He remembers many calamities incurred by folly, many oppotunities lost by negligence. The shades of the dead rise up before him; and he laments the companions of his youth, the partners of his amusements, the assistants of his labours, whom the hand of death has snatched

away.

empty splendour and to airy fiction, that art which is now employed in diffusing friendship, in reviving tenderness, in quickening the affections of the absent, and continuing the presence of the dead.

Yet in a nation, great and opulent, there is room, and ought to be patronage, for an art like that of painting through all its diversities; and it is to be wished, that the reward now offered for an historical picture may excite an honest emulation, and give beginning to an English

It is not very easy to find an action or event that can be efficaciously represented by a painter.

When an offer was made to Themistocles of teaching him the art of memory, he answered, that he would rather wish for the art of forget-school. fulness. He felt his imagination haunted by phantoms of misery which he was unable to suppress, and would gladly have calmed his thoughts with some oblivious antidote. this we all resemble one another: the hero and the sage are like vulgar mortals, overburdened by the weight of life; all shrink from recollection, and all wish for an art of forget

fulness.

No. 45.] SATURDAY, FEB. 24, 1758.

In

He must have an action not successive, but instantaneous; for the time of a picture is a single moment. For this reason the death of Hercules cannot well be painted, though at the first view it flatters the imagination with very glittering ideas; the gloomy mountain overhanging the sea, and covered with trees, some bending to the wind, and some torn from the root by the raging hero; the violence with which he sends from his shoulders the envenomed garment; the propriety with which his muscular

THERE is in many minds a kind of vanity ex-nakedness may be displayed: the death of erted to the disadvantage of themselves; a desire to be praised for superior acuteness discovered only in the degradation of their species, or censure of their country.

Lycas whirled from the promontory; the gigan tic presence of Philoctetes; the blaze of the fatal pile, which the deities behold with grief and terror from the sky.

Defamation is sufficiently copious. The gen- All these images fill the mind, but will not eral lampooner of mankind my find long exer- compose a picture, because they cannot be cise for his zeal or wit, in the defects of nature, united in a single moment. Hercules must the vexations of life, the follies of opinion, and have rent his flesh at one time, and tossed the corruptions of practice. But fiction is easi-Lycas into the air at another; he must first er than discernment; and most of these writers tear up the trees, and then lie down upon the spare themselves the labour of inquiry, and ex- pile. haust their virulence upon imaginary crimes, which, as they never existed can never be mended.

That the painters find no encouragement among the English for many other works than portraits, has been imputed to national selfishness. 'Tis vain, says the satirist, to set before any Englishman the scenes of landscapes, or the heroes of history; nature and antiquity are nothing in his eye; he has no value but for himself, nor desires any copy but of his own

form.

The action must be circumstantial and distinct. There is a passage in the Iliad which cannot be read without strong emotions. A Trojan prince, seized by Achilles in the battle, falls at his feet, and in moving terms supplicates for life. "How can a wretch like thee," says the haughty Greek, "intreat to live when thou knowest that the time must come when Achilles is to die?" This cannot be painted, because no peculiarity of attitude or disposition can so supply the place of language as to impress the

sentiment.

The event painted must be such as excites passions, and different passions in the several actors or a tumult of contending passion in the chief.

Whoever is delighted with his own picture must derive his pleasure from the pleasure of another. Every man is always present to himself, and has, therefore, little need of his own resemblance, nor can desire it, but for the sake Perhaps the discovery of Ulysses by his nurse of those whom he loves, and by whom he is of this kind. The surprise of the nurse hopes to be remembered. This use of the art is mingled with joy; that of Ulysses checked by a natural and reasonable consequence of affec-prudence, and clouded by solicitude; and the tion; and though, like other human actions, it is often complicated with pride, yet even such pride is more laudable than that, by which palaces are covered with pictures, that, however excellent, neither imply the owner's virtue nor excite it.

distinctness of the action by which the scar is found; all concur to complete the subject. But the picture, having only two figures, will want variety.

A much nobler assemblage may be furnished by the death of Epaminondas. The mixture of Genius is chiefly exerted in historical pic- gladness and grief in the face of the messenger tures; and the art of the painter of portraits is who brings his dying general an account of often lost in the obscurity of his subject. But the victory; the various passions of the attenit is in painting as in life, what is greatest is dants; the sublimity of composure in the he not always best. I should grieve to see Rey-ro, while the dart is by his own command nolds transfer to heroes and to goddesses, to drawn from his side, and the faint gleam of

tell. She always gives her directions oblique and allusively, by the mention of something relative or consequential, without any other purpose than to exercise my acuteness and her own.

satisfaction that diffuses itself over the languor | She has nothing to hide, yet nothing will she of death, are worthy of that pencil which yet I do not wish to see employed upon them. If the design were not too multifarious and extensive, I should wish that our painters would attempt the dissolution of the parliament by Cromwell. The point of time may be chosen when Cromwell looked round the Pandaemonium with contempt, ordered the bauble to be taken away; and Harrison laid hands on the speaker to drag him from the

chair.

The various appearances which rage, and terror, and astonishment, and guilt, might exhibit in the faces of that hateful assembly, of whom the principal persons may be faithfully drawn from portraits or prints; the irresolute repugnance of some, the hypocritical submission of others, the ferocious insolence of Cromwell, the rugged brutality of Harrison, and the general trepidation of fear and wickedness, would, if some proper disposition could be contrived, make a picture of unexampled variety, and irresistible instruction.

No. 46.] SATURDAY, MARCH 3, 1759.

MR. IDLER,

I AM encouraged, by the notice you have taken of Betty Broom, to represent the miseries which I suffer from a species of tyranny which, I believe, is not very uncommon, though perhaps it may have escaped the observation of those who converse little with fine ladies, or see them only in their public characters.

It is impossible to give a notion of this style otherwise than by examples. One night, when she had sat writing letters till it was time to be dressed, "Molly," said she, "the ladies are all to be at court to-night in white aprons." When she means that I should send to order the chair, she says, "I think the streets are clean I may venture to walk." When she would have something put into its place, she bids me "lay it on the floor." If she would have me snuff the candles, she asks, "whether I think her eyes are like a cat's?" If she thinks her chocolate delayed, she talks of the benefit of abstinence. If any needlework is forgotten, she supposes that I have heard of the lady who died by pricking her finger.

She always imagines that I can recall every thing past from a single word. If she wants her head from the milliner she only says, "Molly, you know Mrs. Tape." If she would have the mantua-maker sent for, she remarks that "Mr. Taffety, the mercer, was here last week." She ordered, a fortnight ago, that the first time she was abroad all-day I should choose her a new set of coffee-cups at the china-shop; of this she reminded me yesterday, as she was going down stairs, by saying, "You can't find your way now to Pall-Mall."

All this would not vex me, if, by increasing To this method of venting my vexation I my trouble, she spared her own; but, dear am the more inclined, because if I do not com- Mr. Idler, is it not as easy to say coffee-cups, plain to you, I must burst in silence; for my as Pall-Mall? and to tell me in plain words what mistress has teased me, and teased me till II am to do, and when it is to be done, as to can hold no longer, and yet I must not tell torment her own head with the labour of findher of her tricks. The girls that live in com- ing hints, and mine with that of understandmon services can quarrel, and give warning, ing them? and find other places; but we that live with great ladies, if we once offend them, have nothing left but to return into the country.

When first I came to this lady, I had nothing like the learning that I have now; for she has many books, and I have much time to read; so I am waiting maid to a lady who keeps the that of late I have seldom missed her meaning: best company, and is seen at every place of fa- but when she first took me I was an ignorant shionable resort. I am envied by all the maids girl; and she, who, as is very common, conin the square, for few countesses leave off so founded want of knowledge with want of unmany clothes as my mistress, and nobody shares derstanding, began once to despair of bringing with me; so that I supply two families in the me to any thing, because, when I came into her country with finery for the assizes and horse-chamber at the call of her bell, she asked me, races, besides what I wear myself. The steward and house-keeper have joined against me to procure my removal, that they may advance a relation of their own; but their designs are found out by my lady, who says I need not fear them, for she will never have dow dies about her.

You would think, Mr. Idler, like others, that I am very happy, and may well be contented with my lot. But I will tell you. My lady has an odd humour. She never orders any thing in direct words, for she loves a sharp girl that can take a hint.

I would not have you suspect that she has any thing to hint which she is ashamed to speak at length; for none can have greater purity of sentiment, or rectitude of intention.

"Whether we lived in Zembla ;" and I did not guess the meaning of inquiry, but modestly answered that I could not tell. She had happened to ring once when I did not hear her, and meant to put me in mind of that country where sounds are said to be congealed by the frost.

Another time, as I was dressing her head, she began to talk on a sudden of Medusa and snakes, and "men turned into stone, and maids that, if they were not watched, would let their mistresses be Gorgons." I looked round me half frightened, and quite bewildered; till at last, finding that her literature was thrown away upon me, she bid me, with great vehemence, reach the curling-irons.

It is not without some indignation, Mr. Idler,

that I discover, in these artifices of vexation, something worse than foppery or caprice; a mean delight in superiority, which knows itself in no danger of reproof or opposition; a cruel pleasure in seeing the perplexity of a mind obliged to find what is studiously concealed, and a mean indulgence of petty malevolence in the sharp censure of involuntary, and very often of inevitable failings. When, beyond her expectation, I hit upon her meaning I can perceive a sudden cloud of disappointment spread over her face; and have sometimes been afraid lest I should lose her favour by understanding her when she means to puzzle me.

In time he found that ale disagreed with his constitution, and went every night to drink his pint at a tavern, where he met with a set of critics, who disputed upon the merits of the different theatrical performers. By these idle fellows he was taken to the play, which at first he did not seem much to heed; for he owned, that he very seldom knew what they were do ing, and that, while his companions would let him alone, he was commonly thinking on his last bargain.

Having once gone, however, he went again and again, though I often told him that three shillings were thrown away; at last he grew uneasy if he missed a night, and importuned me to go with him. I went to a tragedy which they called Macbeth; and, when I came home, told him, that I could not bear to see men and women make themselves such fools, by pretend

This day, however, she has conquered my sagacity. When she went out of her dressingroom she said nothing but "Molly, you know," and hastened to her chariot. What I am to know is yet a secret; but if I do not knowing to be witches and ghosts, generals and before she comes back, what I have yet no means of discovering, she will make my dulness a pretence for a fortnight's ill humour, treat me as a creature devoid of the faculties necessary to the common duties of life, and perhaps give the next gown to the housekeeper.

I am, Sir,

Your humble servant,

MOLLY QUICK.

No. 47.] SATURDAY, MARCH 10, 1759.
TO THE IDLER.

MR. IDLER,

I AM the unfortunate wife of a city wit, and cannot but think that my case may deserve equal compassion with any of those which have been represented in your paper.

I married my husband within three months after the expiration of his apprenticeship; we put our money together, and furnished a large and splendid shop, in which he was for five years and a half diligent and civil. The notice which curiosity or kindness commonly bestows on beginners, was continued by confidence and esteem; one customer, pleased with his treatment and his bargain recommended another; and we were busy behind the counter from morning to night.

Thus every day increased our wealth and our reputation. My husband was often invited to dinner openly on the Exchange by hundredthousand-pounds men; and whenever I went to any of the halls, the wives of the aldermen made me low courtesies. We always took up our notes before the day, and made all considerable payments by drafts upon our banker.

kings, and to walk in their sleep when they were as much awake as those that looked at them. He told me that I must get higher notions, and that a play was the most rational of all entertainments, and most proper to relax the mind after the business of the day.

By degrees he gained knowledge of some of the players; and when the play was over, very frequently treated them with suppers; for which he was admitted to stand behind the

scenes.

He soon began to lose some of his morning hours in the same folly, and was for one winter very diligent in his attendance on the rehearsals; but of this species of idleness he grew weary, and said, that the play was nothing without the company.

His ardour for the diversion of the evening increased; he bought a sword, and paid five shillings a night to sit in the boxes; he went sometimes into a place which he calls the greenroom where all the wits of the age assembled; and, when he had been there, could do nothing for two or three days but repeat their jests, or tell their disputesd

He has now lost his regard for every thing but the play-house: he invites, three times a week, one or other to drink claret, and talk of the drama. His first care in the morning is to read the play-bills; and, if he remembers any lines of the tragedy which is to be represented, walks about the shop, repeating them so loud, and with such strange gestures, that the pas sengers gather round the door.

His greatest pleasure, when I married him, was to hear the situation of his shop commended, and to be told how many estates have been got in it by the same trade; but of late he grows peevish at any mention of business, and delights in nothing so much as to be told that he speaks like Mossop.

You will easily believe that I was well enough pleased with my condition; for what Among his new associates he has learned happiness can be greater than that of growing another language, and speaks in such a strain every day richer and richer? I will not deny that his neighbours cannot understand him. that, imagining myself likely to be in a short If a customer talks longer than he is willing time the sheriff's lady, I broke off my acquain- to hear, he will complain that he has been tance with some of my neighbours; and advis- excrutiated with unmeaning verbosity; he ed my husband to keep good company, and laughs at the letters of his friends for their not to be seen with men that were worth no-tameness of expression, and often declares thing.