of hazardous actions for the good of others, at the same time gratifying their passion for glory; so do worthy minds in the domestic way of life deny themselves many advantages, to satisfy a generous benevolence, which they bear to their friends oppressed with distresses and calamities. Such natures one may call stores of Providence, which are actuated by a secret celestial influence to undervalue the ordinary gratifications of wealth, to give comfort to an heart loaded with affliction, to save a falling family, to preserve a branch of trade in their neighbourhood, to give work to the industrious, preserve the portion of the helpless infant, and raise the head of the mourning father. People whose hearts are wholly bent towards pleasure, or intent upon gain, never hear of the noble occurrences among men of industry and humanity. It would look like a city romance, to tell them of the generous merchant, who the other day sent this billet to an eminent trader under difficulties to support himself, in whose fall many hundreds besides himself had perished: but because I think there is more spirit and true gallantry in it than in any letter I have ever read from Strephon to Phillis, I shall insert it even in the mercantile honest style in which it was sent:

SIR,

'I HAVE heard of the casualties which have involved you in extreme distress at this time; and knowing you to be a man of great good-nature, industry, and probity, have resolved to stand by you. Be of good cheer; the bearer brings with him five thousand pounds, and has my order to answer your drawing as much more on my account. I did this in haste, for fear I should come too late for your relief; but you may value yourself with me to the sum of fifty thousand pounds; for I can very cheerfully run

the hazard of being so much less rich than I am now, to save an honest man whom I love. Your friend and servant,

W. S.*,

I think there is somewhere in Montaigne mention made of a family-book, wherein all the occurrences that happened from one generation of that house to another were recorded. Were there such a method in the families which are concerned in this generosity, it would be an hard task for the greatest in Europe to give in their own, an instance of a benefit better placed, or conferred with a more graceful air. It has been heretofore urged how barbarous and inhuman is any unjust step made to the disadvantage of a trader; and by how much such an act towards him is detestable, by so much an act of kindness towards him is laudable. I remember to have heard a bencher of the Temple tell a story of a tradition in their house, where they had formerly a custom of choosing kings for such a season, and allowing him his expences at the charge of the society. One of our kings †, said my friend, carried his royal inclination too far, and there was a committee ordered to look into the management of his treasury. Among other things it appeared, that his majesty walking incog. in the cloister, had overheard a poor man say to another, Such a small sum would make me the happiest man in the world.' The king, out of his 1oyal compassion, privately inquired into his character, and finding him a proper object of charity,

6

The merchant involved in distress by casualties, was one Mr. Moreton, a linen-draper, and the generous merchant here so justly celebrated, was Sir William Scawen.

This king, it is said, was beau Nash, director of the public diversions at Bath, who was in King William's time a student in the Temple,

sent him the money. When the committee read the report, the house passed his accounts with a plaudite without farther examination upon the recital of this

article in them:

For making a man happy. . . . . . £. 10 0 0

T.

N° 249. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1711.

Γέλως ἄκαιρῷ ἐν βροτοῖς δεινὸν κακόν.

Frag. Vet. Poet.

Mirth out of season is a grievous ill.

WHEN I make choice of a subject that has not been treated on by others, I throw together my reflections on it without any order or method, so that they may appear rather in the looseness and freedom of an essay, than in the regularity of a set discourse. It is after this manner that I shall consider laughter and ridicule in my present paper.

Man is the merriest species of the creation, all above and below him are serious. He sees things in a different light from other beings, and finds his mirth arising from objects that perhaps cause something like pity or displeasure in higher nature. Laughter is indeed a very good counterpoise to the spleen; and it seems but reasonable that we should be capable of receiving joy from what is no real good to us, since we can receive grief from what is no real evil.

I have in my forty-seventh paper raised a speculation on the notion of a modern philosopher * who

* Hobbes.