From my own Apartment, July 21. BEFORE I withdraw from business for the night, it is my cuftom to receive all addreffes to me, that others may go to reft as well as myself, at least as far as I can contribute to it. When I called to know if any would speak with me, I was informed that Mr. Mills, the player, defired to be admitted. He was fo; and with much modefty acquainted me, as he did other people of note, that Hamlet was to be acted on Wednesday next. for his benefit. I had long wanted to fpeak with this perfon; because I thought I could admonish him of many things which would tend to his improvement. In the general I obferved to him, that though action was his business, the way to that action was not to ftudy gefture; for the beha❤ viour would follow the fentiments of the mind. Action to the player is what speech is to an orator. If the matter be well conceived, words. will flow with ease; and if the actor is well poffeffed of the nature of his part, a proper action will neceffarily follow. He informed me, that Wilks was to act Hamlet. I defired him to request of him, in my name, that he would wholly forget Mr. Betterton; for that he failed in no part of Othello, but where he had him in view. An actor's forming himfelf by the carriage of another is like the trick among the widows, who lament their husbands as the neighbours did theirs, and not according to their own fentiments of the deceased. There is a fault alfo in the audience, which interrupts their fatisfaction very much; that is, the figuring to themselves the actor in fome part wherein they formerly particularly liked him, and not attending to the part he is at that time performing. Thus, whatever Wilks, who is the ftricteft follower of nature, is acting, the vulgar fpectators turn their thoughts upon Sir Harry Wildair. When I had indulged the loquacity of an old man for fome time, in fome loose hints, I took my leave of Mr. Mills; and was told, Mr. Elliot, of Saint James's coffeehoufe, would fpeak with me. His bufinefs was to defire I would, as I am an aftrologer, let him know beforehand, who who were to have the benefit tickets in the ensuing lottery; which knowledge, he was of opinion, he could turn to great account, as he was concerned in news. I granted his request, upon an oath of fecrecy, that he would only make his own use of it, and not let it be publicly known until after they were drawn. I had not done fpeaking, when he produced to me a plan which he had formed of keeping books, with the names of all fuch adventurers, and the numbers of their tickets, as fhould come to him; in order to give an hourly account of what tickets fhall come up during the whole time of the lottery, the drawing of which is to begin on Wednefday next. I liked his method of difguifing the fecret I had told him; and pronounced him a thriving man, who could fo well watch the motions of things, and profit by a prevailing humour and impatience fo aptly, as to make his honeft industry agreeable to his cuftomers, as it is to be the meffenger of their good fortune. ADVERTISEMENT.. From the Trumpet in Sheer-lane, July 20.. Ordered, That, for the improvement of the pleasures of fociety, a member of this houfe, one of the most wakeful of the foporific affembly beyond Smithfield-bars, and one of the order of ftory-tellers in Holborn, may meet and exchange stale matter, and report the fame to their principals. N. B. No man is to tell above one story in the fame evening; but has liberty to tell the fame the night following. Mr. Bickerstaff defires his love-correfpondents to vary the names they fhall affume in their future letters ; for that he is overstocked with Philanders." NO. 202. TUESDAY, JULY 25, 1710. -Eft hic, Eft Ulubris, animus fi te non deficit æquus. HOR. Ep. 11. lib. 1. ver. ult. True happiness is to no fpot confin'd; R. WYNNE. From my own Apartment, July 24. THIS afternoon I went to vifit a gentleman of my acquaintance at Mile-end; and, paffing through Stepney church-yard, I could not forbear entertaining myself with the infcriptions on the tombs and graves. Among others; I obferved one with this notable memorial: Here lies the body of T. B.' This fantastical defire, of being remembered only by the two first letters of a name, led me into the contemplation of the vanity and imperfect attainments of ambition in general. When I ran back in my imagination all the men whom I have ever known and conversed with in my whole life, there are but very few who have not ufed their faculties in the purfuit of what it is impoffible to acquire; or left the poffeffion of what they might have been, at their fetting out, mafters, to fearch for it where it was out of their reach. In this thought it was not poffible to forget the inftance of Pyrrhus, who, propofing to himself, in discourse with a philofopher, one, and another, and another conqueft, was afked, what he would do after all that? Then, fays the king, we will make merry. He was well anfwered, What hinders your doing that in the condition you are already? The restlefs defire of exerting themselves above the common level of mankind is not to be refifted in fome tempers; and minds of this make may be observed in every condition VOL. IV. D of of life. Where fuch men do not make to themfelves, or meet with employment, the foil of their conftitution runs into tares and weeds. An old friend of mine, who loft a major's poft forty years ago, and quitted, has ever fince ftudied maps, encampments, retreats, and countermarches; with no other defign but to feed his fpleen and ill-humour, and furnish himself with matter for arguing against all the successful actions of others. He that, at his firft fetting out in the world, was the gayeft man in our regiment; ventured his life with alacrity, and enjoyed it with fatisfaction; encouraged men below him, and was courted by men above him, has been ever fince the most froward creature breathing. His warm complexion spends itself now only in a general spirit of contradiction; for which he watches all occafions, and is, in his conversation, ftill upon fentry, treats all men like enemies, with every other impertinence of a fpeculative warrior. . He, that obferves in himself this natural inquietude, fhould take all imaginable care to put his mind in fome method of gratification; or he will foon find himself grow into the condition of this difappointed major. Inftead of courting proper occafions to rife above others, he will be ever studious of pulling others down to him; it being the common refuge of disappointed ambition to ease themselves by detraction. It would be no great argument against ambition, that there are fuch mortal things in the disappointment of it; but it certainly is a forcible exception, that there can be no folid happiness in the fuccefs of it. If we value popular praife, it is in the power of the meaneft of the people to disturb us by calumny. If the fame of being happy, we cannot look into a village but we fee crowds in actual poffeffion of what we seek only the appearance. To this may be added, that there is I know not what malignity in the minds of ordinary men, to oppose you in what they fee you fond of; and it is a certain exception against a man's receiving applaufe, that he vifibly courts it. However, this is not only the paffion of great and undertaking fpirits, but you fee it in the lives of such as, one would believe, were far enough removed from the ways of ambition. ambition. The rural efquires of this nation even eat and drink out of vanity. A vain-glorious fox-hunter shall entertain half a county, for the oftentation of his beef and beer, without the leaft affection for any of the crowd about him. He feeds them, because he thinks it a fuperiority over them that he does fo; and they devour him, because they know he treats them out of infolence. This, indeed, is ambition in grotesque; but may figure to us the condition of politer men, whofe only purfuit is glory. When the superior acts out of a principle of vanity, the dependant will be fure to allow it him; because he knows it deftructive of the very applause which is courted by the man who favours him, and confequently makes him nearer himself. But as every man living has more or less of this incentive, which makes men impatient of an inactive condition, and urges men to attempt what may tend to their reputation; it is abfolutely neceffary they should form to themselves an ambition which is in every man's power to gratify. This ambition would be independent, and would confist only in acting what, to a man's own mind, appears moft great and laudable. It is, a purfuit in the power of every man, and is only a regular profecution of what he himself approves. It is what can be interrupted by no outward accidents; for no man can be robbed of his good intention. One of our fociety of the Trumpet therefore started last night a notion, which I thought had reafon in it. It is, methinks, said he, an unreasonable thing, that heroic virtue fhould, as it feems to be at prefent, be confined to a certain order of men, and be attainable by none but those whom fortune has elevated to the most confpicuous ftations. I would have every thing to be efteemed as heroic, which is great and uncommon in the circumftances of the man who performs it. Thus there would be no virtue in hu man life, which every one of the fpecies would not have a pretence to arrive at, and an ardency to exert. Since fortune is not in our power, let us be as little as poffible in hers. Why should it be neceffary that a man fhould be rich, to be generous? If we measured by the quality and not the quantity of things, the particulars which D'2 accompany |