As it is natural to have a fondness for what has cost us much time and attention to produce, hope your Grace will forgive my endeavour to preserve this work from oblivion, by affixing to it your memorable name. I shall not here presume to mention the ill trious passages of your life, which are celebrated by the whole age, and have been the subject of the most sublime pens; but if I could convey you to posterity in your private character, and describe the stature, the behaviour, and aspect of the Duke of Marlborough, I question not but it would of their being sensible of the earl's own merit, constituted ban captain-general of their forces, and assigned him a pension of one • John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, and Prince of the handred thousand florins per annum. To relate all the achieveHoly Roman Empire, one of the ablest statesmen, and most po.ments he performed during the ten years that ensued, i. e. frum lite courtiers, as well as one of the greatest generals, and most 1702 to 1712, would be almost to give a history of Queen Anne's illustrious heroes of his age, was the son of Sir Winston Churchill, reign. It may be sufficient here to observe, that he defeated the of Wotton Basset, in Wiltshire, and born at Ashe, in Devonshire, French armies, though headed by their ablest generals, and al June 24, 1650. He was at first page of honour to James Duke of ways superior to him in point of number, in several pitched York; but being strongly inclined to a military life, he obtained, battles, at Blenheim, at Ramilies, at Oudenard, at Malplaquet, at the age of sixteen, an ensigncy in the guards, and in that qua &c.; that he reduced almost every place of importance in the lity served against the Moors at Tangier. In the war with the French and Spanish Netherlands; saved the empire; secured the Dutch in 1672, he served under the Duke of Monmouth in the United Provinces; raised the glory and consequence of Grest French army, where he distinguished himself so much by his gal. Britain; and humbled the pride of the French monarch to such a lantry and conduct, that he received the thanks of the French degree, that that ambitious prince, who, but a few monarch at the head of the army. The Duke of Monmouth too, had seized, in imagination, the dominions of all his neighbour, at his return to England declared to King Charles the Second now began, in earnest, to tremble for his own. In a word, it may that he owed his life at the siege of Maestrich to the bravery of be said of this general, what can hardly be said of any other, that Captain Churchill.' This opened the way for his further advance he never fought a battle which he did not gain, nor ever besieged ment; and he was accordingly appointed lieutenant-colonel of a town which he did not take. Even in the earlier part of his life, Littleton's regiment, and gentleman of the bed-chamber, and master of the robes to James Duke of York. This prince he af. terwards attended to the Low Countries, and to Scotland; and it was by the interest of his royal highness, that, in 1682, he was made Baron of Eymouth, and colonel of the third troop of guards. Upon the accession of King James to the throne, he was created Baron Churchill, of Sandridge, in the county of Hertford, and years before he gave evident signs of what he afterwards proved. Prate Vandemont, it is said, delivered himself to King William in the following terms: There is somewhat in the Earl of Marlborough that I want words to express; he has all the fierceness of Kirke all the judgment of Laniere, all the conduct of Mackay, and al the intrepidity of Colchester; and either my skill in faces decora me, which yet it never did, or he will make a greater figure as I made brigadier-general of his majesty's army; and in this last ca- general, than any subject your majesty has.' The king sma pacity he had a considerable share in suppressing the Duke of and replied, Marlborough is obliged to you; but I really believe Monmouth's rebellion. Great, however, as were the obligations you will lose no credit by your prediction.' His great menit met wit which he lay under to his sovereign, those which he owed to his a suitable reward. He was honoured, six different times, with the country were, in his opinion, much greater; for when he saw thanks of the house of commons, was created a duke, had a pe King Jamnes taking strides toward destroying the religion and lision of five thousand pounds a year settled upon him out of the berties of his country, he immediately deserted him, and went post-office revenue, and was presented with the manor of Wool over to the Prince of Orange. In the subsequent reign he en stock and the hundred of Wotton, where the queen caused to be joyed the same influence which he had possessed in the preced erected for him a noble edifice, called Blenheim-house, in memory ing. He was sworn of the privy council, made one of the gen- of the victory which he had gained at that place. He was like tlemen of the queen's bed-chamber, and created Earl of Marl-wise created a prince of the empire, by the title of Prince of Mi borough. He afterwards served with great reputation, both in denheim, in the province of Swabia. His prudence and moder Flanders and in Ireland ; but, in 1692, he was dismissed from all tion were equal to his other great qualities. For when, op his employments, and even thrown into the tower on a suspicion the change of the ministry in 1710, he found his interest at courte of high treason. This suspicion, however, appearing, upon ex considerably diminished, or rather totally annihilated, he stille amination, to be altogether groundless, he was restored to favour, tinued to serve his country in his military capacity; and whe and appointed governor to the Duke of Gloucester, whom King stripped of his command about two years after, and even erell William delivered into his hands with this remarkable expression, and unjustly persecuted, instead of embroiling the administrati My lord, make him but what you are, and my nephew will be by his personal disputes, he retired into a foreign country, whit all that I wish to see him.' Upon the accession of Queen Anne he remained till the decease of Queen Anne; and returning to to the throne, he was made a knight of the garter, and captain England at the accession of King George the First, he was if general of her majesty's forces, and sent over to Holland with the that prince reinstated in all his former employments. He died character of ambassador extraordinary, and minister plenipoten- June 16, 1722, in the seventy-third year of his age, and was th tiary. The states too, in compliment to the queen, and as a proof terred with great funeral pomp in Westminster abbey. De to men ut if I co iour, estion re a history de observe, th fill the reader with more agreeable images, and One cannot, indeed, without offence to your- N° 252. WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 19, 1711. Erranti, passimque oculos per cuncta ferenti. VIRG. En. ii. ver. 570. Exploring ev'ry place with curious eyes. 6 MR. SPECTATOR, the eye, that you have not thoroughly stuAM very sorry to find by your discourse upon Nor were it a circumstance to be mentioned, if the graces and attractions of your person were not the died the nature and force of that part of a beauonly pre-eminence you have above others, which teous face. Had you ever been in love, you would is left, almost unobserved, by greater writers. have said ten thousand things, which it seems did Yet how pleasing would it be to those who shall not occur to you. Do but reflect upon the nonsense it makes men talk, the flames which it is said read the surprising revolutions in your story, to be to kindle, the transport it raises, the dejection it made acquainted with your ordinary life and de-causes in the bravest men; and if you do believe portment! How pleasing would it be to hear, that those things are expressed to an extravagance, yet you will own, that the influence of it is very great, the same man who carried fire and sword into the which moves men to that extravagance. Certain countries of all that had opposed the cause of li-it is, that the whole strength of the mind is someberty, and struck a terror into the armies of France, times seated there; that a kind look imparts all that a year's discourse could give you, in one mohad, in the midst of his high station, a behaviour ment. What matters it what she says to you?" See years there as gentle as is usual in the first steps towards great- how she looks," is the language of all who know ness! And if it were possible to express that easy and expressed in a glance, did you never observe what love is. When the mind is thus summed up bir his grandeur, which did at once persuade and com- a sudden joy arise in the countenance of a lover? mand, it would appear as clearly to those to come, Did you never see the attendance of years paid, Ouded as it does to his contemporaries, that all the great know that the intelligence of affection is carried on overpaid in an instant? You a Spectator, and not events which were brought to pass under the con- by the eye only; that good-breeding has made the duct of so well-governed a spirit, were the blessings tongue falsify the heart, and act a part of contiupon wisdom and valour; and all which nual constraint, while nature has preserved the eyes to herself, that she may not be disguised, or seem adverse fell out by divine permission, which misrepresented. The poor bride can give her hand, and say, "I do," with a languishing air, to the You have passed that year of life wherein the man she is obliged by cruel parents to take for mercenary reasons, but at the same time she can not most able and fortunate captain, before your time, look as if she loved; her eye is full of sorrow, and the car declared he had lived enough both to nature and reluctance sits in a tear, while the offering of a to glory; and your grace may make that reflection sacrifice is performed in what we call the marriage with much more justice. He spoke it after he had distinguish between the eyes of those who go to ceremony. Do you never go to plays? Cannot you the arrived at empire by an usurpation upon those see, from those who come to be seen? I am a wowhom he had enslaved; but the Prince of Mindelman turned of thirty, and am on the observation a place d'ap red the er and cor French of Heaven the Ex the we are not to search into. heim may rejoice in a sovereignty, which was the gift of him whose dominions he had preserved. Glory established upon the uninterrupted success Hag of honourable designs and actions, is not subject to diminution; nor can any attempts prevail against it, but in the proportion which the narrow circuit of rumour bears to the unlimited extent of fame. We may congratulate your Grace not only upon your high achievements, but likewise upon the happy expiration of your command, by which your glory is put out of the power of fortune: and when your person shall be so too, that the Author and Disposer of all things may place you in that higher mansion of bliss and immortality which is prepared for good princes, law-givers, and heroes, when he in his due time removes them from the envy of mankind, is the hearty prayer of, MY LORD, Your Grace's most obedient, little; therefore if you, or your correspondent, had consulted me in your discourse on the eye, I could have told you that the eye of Leonora is slily watchful while it looks negligent; she looks round her without the help of the glasses you speak of,† and yet seems to be employed on objects directly before her. This eye is what affects chance-medley, and on a sudden, as if it attended to another thing, turns all its charms against an ogler. The eye of Lusitania is an instrument of premeditated murder; but the design being visible, destroys the execution of it; and with much more beauty than is a brave soldier's daughter in town, that by her that of Leonora, it is not half so mischievous. There eye has been the death of more than ever her father made fly before him. A beautiful eye makes silence eloquent, a kind eye makes contradiction an assent, an enraged eye makes beauty deformed. This little member gives life to every other part about us, and I believe the story of Argus implies is to say, every other part would be mutilated, no more, than that the eye is in every part; that were not its force represented more by the eye, than even by itself. But this is heathen Greck to those who have not conversed by glances. This, sir, is a language in which there can be no deceit,[ nor can a skilful observer be imposed upon by] looks, even among politicians and courtiers. If N° 253. THURSDAY, DECEMBER 20, 1711. you do me the honour to print this among your speculations, I shall in my next make you a present of a secret history, by translating all the looks of the next assembly of ladies and gentlemen into words, to adorn some future paper. MR. SPECTATOR, 'Your humble servant, BARBARA CRABTREE.' Indignor quicquam reprehendi, non quia crasse I lose my patience, and I own it too, THERE is nothing which more denotes a great mind than the abhorrence of envy and detraction. This passion reigns more among bad poets than among any other set of men. As there are none more ambitious of fame, than those who are conversant in poetry, it is very natu ral for such as have not succeeded in it to depre ciate the works of those who have. For since they cannot raise themselves to the reputation of their fellow-writers, they must endeavour to sink it to their own pitch, if they would still keep themselves upon a level with them. The greatest wits that ever were produced in THOUGH I am a practitioner in the law of some one age, lived together in so good an understand standing, and have heard many eminent pleaders ing, and celebrated one another with so much ge in my time, as well as other eloquent speakers of nerosity, that each of them receives an addition. both universities, yet I agree with you, that women lustre from his contemporaries, and is more famous are better qualified to succeed in oratory than the for having lived with men of so extraordinary men, and believe this is to be resolved into natural genius, than if he had himself been the sole wonder causes. You have mentioned only the volubility of the age. I need not tell my reader, that I here of their tongue; but what do you think of the point at the reign of Augustus; and I believe he silent flattery of their pretty faces, and the per-will be of my opinion, that neither Virgil nor Ho suasion which even an insipid discourse carries with race would have gained so great a reputation in it when flowing from beautiful lips, to which it the world, had they not been the friends and adwould be cruel to deny any thing? It is certain mirers of each other. Indeed all the great writers too, that they are possessed of some springs of rhe of that age, for whom singly we have so great an toric which men want, such as tears, fainting-fits, esteem, stand up together as vouchers for one and the like, which I have seen employed upon another's reputation. But at the same time that occasion, with good success. You must know I Virgil was celebrated by Gallus, Propertius, Ho am a plain man, and love my money; yet I have race, Varius, Tucca, and Ovid, we know that a spouse who is so great an orator in this way, that Bavius and Mævius were his declared foes and she draws from me what sums she pleases. Every calumniators. But whither am I stray'd! I need not raise room in my house is furnished with trophies of her In our own country a man seldom sets up for a eloquence, rich cabinets, piles of china, Japan poet, without attacking the reputation of all his screens, and costly jars; and if you were to come brothers in the art. The ignorance of the moderns, into my great parlour, you would fancy yourself the scribblers of the age, the decay of poetry, are in an India warehouse. Besides this she keeps a the topics of detraction with which he makes his squirrel, and I am doubly taxed to pay for the entrance into the world: but how much more nobie china he breaks. She is seized with periodical fits is the fame that is built on candour and ingenuity, about the time of the subscriptions to a new opera, according to those beautiful lines of Sir John Denand is drowned in tears after having seen any wo-ham, in his poem on Fletcher's works! man there in finer clothes than herself. These are arts of persuasion purely feminine, and which a tender heart cannot resist. What I would therefore desire of you, is, to prevail with your friend who has promised to dissect a female tongue, that| he would at the same time give us the anatomy of a female eye, and explain the springs and sluices I am sorry to find that an author, who is very which feed it with such ready supplies of moisture; justly esteemed among the best judges, bas a and likewise show by what means, if possible, they mitted some strokes of this nature into a very fire may be stopped at a reasonable expense. Or, in-poem; I mean The Art of Criticism, which was deed, since there is something so moving in the very published some months since, and is a masterpiece image of weeping beauty, it would be worthy his in its kind. The observations follow one another art to provide, that these eloquent drops may no like those in Horace's Art of Poetry, without that more be lavished on trifles, or employed as servants methodical regularity which would have been re to their wayward wills; but reserved for serious quisite in a prose author. They are some of them occasions in life, to adorn generous pity, true peni- uncommon, but such as the reader must assent to, tence, or real sorrow. when he sees them explained with that elegance and perspicuity in which they are delivered. As for those which are the most known, and the most received, they are placed in so beautiful a light, 'I am, &c.' STEELE. This letter by HUGHES. T. • Pope. d I owe it to urid, not as hed,bt wi POPE Και μεν Σισύφον εισείδον, κρατερ αλγες εχονία, and illustrated with such apt allusions, that they in the four first it is heaved up by several spondees have in them all the graces of novelty, and make intermixed with proper breathing places, and at DAY, DECEM the reader, who was before acquainted with them, last trundles down in a continual line of dactyls: still more convinced of their truth and solidity. And here give me leave to mention what Monsieur Boileau has so very well enlarged upon in the preface to his works, that wit and fine writing do not consist so much in advancing things that are new, as in giving things that are known an agreeable turn. It is impossible for us, who live in the latter ages of the world, to make observations in criticism, morality, or in any art or science, which have not been touched upon by others. We have little else left us, but to represent the common sense of mankind in more strong, more beautiful, or more uncommon lights. If a reader examines Horace's Art of Poetry, he will find but very few precepts in it, which he may not meet with in Aristotle, and which were not commonly known by all the poets of the Augustan age. His way of expressing and applying them, not his invention of them, is what we are chiefly to admire. Eh more den envy and deer ong bad per Ore ambitious nt in poetry succeeded who have Fr to the rep t endeavour would still be terer wer nother we m receires! aries, and is For this reason I think there is nothing in the world so tiresome as the works of those critics who ODYSS. 11. "I turn'd my eye, and as I turn'd survey'd It would be endless to quote verses out of Virgil which have this particular kind of beauty in the numbers: but I may take an occasion in a future paper to show several of them which have escaped the observation of others. I cannot conclude this paper without taking non so grodar write in a positive dogmatic way, without either tice that we have three poems in our tongue, which language, genius, or imagination. If the reader are of the same nature, and each of them a masterwould see how the best of the Latin critics wrote, piece in its kind; the Essay on Translated Verse,* he may find their manner very beautifully described the Essay on the Art of Poetry, and the Essay in the characters of Horace, Petronius, Quintilian, Jupon Criticism.‡ and Longinus, as they are drawn in the essay of which I am now speaking. n of so ex Self been thes Il my reade ustus; and t neither z great a en the ed all the ly we har ras vouc at the s allus Ovid, is decks seldom s repute rance d decard: dour sl nes of St Since I have mentioned Longinus, who in his These equal syllables alone require, The gaping of the vowels in the second line, the 'A needless Alexandrine ends the song, That like a wounded snake drags its slow length along.' And afterwards, 'Tis not enough no harshness gives offence, The hoarse rough verse should like the torrent roar. Flies o'er th' unbending corn, and skims along the main.' Σεμνος έρως αρετης, ὁ δε κυπρίδος ασχος οφελλει. On love of virtue reverence attends, WHEN I consider the false impressions which are per MY DEAR HARRIOT, IF thou art she, but oh how fallen, how changed, what an apostate! how lost to all that is gay and agreeable! To be married I find is to be buried alive. I cannot conceive it more dismal to be shut up in a vault to converse with the shades of my ancestors, than to be carried down to an old manor-house in the country, and confined to the conversation of a sober husband, and an awkward chambermaid. For variety I suppose you may entertain yourself with madam in her grogram gown, the spouse of your parish vicar, who has by this time, I am sure, well furnished you with receipts for making salves and possets, distilling cordial waters, making syrups, and applying poultices. 'Blest solitude! I wish thee joy, my dear, of thy The beautiful distich upon Ajax in the foregoing loved retirement, which, indeed, you would perlines puts me in mind of a description in Homer's suade me is very agreeable, and different enough Odyssey, which none of the critics have taken no- from what I have here described: but, child, I am tice of. It is where Sisyphus is represented lift-afraid thy brains are a little disordered with roing his stone up the hill, which is no sooner carried mances and novels. After six months marriage to the top of it, but it immediately tumbles to the to hear thee talk of love, and paint the country bottom. This double motion of the stone is admi rably described in the numbers of these verses; as By the Earl of Roscommon. + By the Duke of Normanby. By Pope. 'I am, MADAM, 'Your most humble servant, 'MARY HOME.' scenes so softly, is a little extravagant; one would you tax me with. She is a discreet, ingenious, think you lived the lives of sylvan deities, or roved pleasant, pious woman; I wish she had the handamong the walks of Paradise, like the first happy ling of you, and Mrs. Modish; you would find, if pair. But pr'ythee leave these whimsies, and come you were too free with her, she would soon make to town in order to live, and talk like other mor- you as charming as ever you were; she would tals. However, as I am extremely interested in make you blush as much as if you never had been your reputation, I would willingly give you a little fine ladies. The vicar, madam, is so kind as to good advice at your first appearance under the visit my husband, and his agreeable conversation character of a married woman. It is a little in- has brought him to enjoy many sober happy hours solent in me, perhaps, to advise a matron; but I when even I am shut out, and my dear master is am so afraid you will make so silly a figure as a entertained only with his own thoughts. These fond wife, that I cannot help warning you not to things, dear madam, will be lasting satisfactions, appear in any public places with your husband, when the fine ladies, and the coxcombs, by whom and never to saunter about St. James's-park toge-they form themselves, are irreparably ridiculous, ther: if you presume to enter the ring at Hyde- ridiculous in old age. park together, you are ruined for ever; nor must you take the least notice of one another at the playhouse, or opera, unless you would be laughed at for a very loving couple, most happily paired in the yoke of wedlock. I would recommend the example of an acquaintance of ours to your imi-You have no goodness in the world, and are not tation; she is the most negligent and fashionable in earnest in any thing you say that is serious, if wife in the world; she is hardly ever seen in the you do not send me a plain answer to this. I hap same place with her husband, and if they happen pened some days past to be at the play, where, to meet, you would think them perfect strangers; during the time of performance, I could not keep she never was heard to name him in his absence, my eyes off from a beautiful young creature, who and takes care he shall never be the subject of any sat just before me, and who I have been since indiscourse that she has a share in. I hope you will formed has no fortune. It would utterly ruin my propose this lady as a pattern, though I am very reputation for discretion to marry such a one, and much afraid you will be so silly to think Portia, by what I can learn she has a character of great &c. Sabine and Roman wives, much brighter ex-modesty, so that there is nothing to be thought on amples. I wish it may never come into your head any other way. My mind has ever since been so to imitate those antiquated creatures so far as to wholly bent on her, that I am much in danger of come into public in the habit, as well as air, of a doing something very extravagant, without your Roman matron. You make already the entertain-speedy advice to, ment of Mrs. Modish's tea-table; she says, she always thought you a discreet person, and qualified to manage a family with admirable prudence; she dies to see what demure and serious airs wedlock DEAR MR. SPECTATOR, 'SIR, 'Your most humble servant.' I am sorry I cannot answer this impatient gentle has given you; but she says, she shall never for-tleman, but by another question. give your choice of so gallant a man as Bellamour DEAR CORRESPONDENT, to transform him to a mere sober husband; it was unpardonable. You see, my dear, we all envy your WOULD you marry to please other people, o? happiness, and no person more than 'Your humble servant, 'LYDIA.' yourself?" Laudis amore tumes? sunt certa piacula, quæ te IMITATED. T. BE not in pain, good madam, for my appear- N° 255. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 22, 1711. ance in town; I shall frequent no public places, or make any visits where the character of a modest wife is ridiculous. As for your wild raillery on matrimony, it is all hypocrisy: you and all the handsome young women of your acquaintance show yourselves to no other purpose than to gain a conquest over some man of worth, in order to bestow your charms and fortune on him. There is no indecency in the confession, the design is THE soul, considered abstractedly from its passions, modest and honourable, and all your affectation is of a remiss and sedentary nature, slow in its re cannot disguise it. solves, and languishing in its executions. The use HOR. Ep. i. l. i. ver. 36. I am married, and have no other concern but therefore of the passions is to stir it up, and to put to please the man I love; he is the end of every it upon action, to awaken the understanding, to care I have; if I dress, it is for him; if I read enforce the will, and to make the whole man more a poem, or a play, it is to qualify myself for a con- vigorous and attentive in the prosecution of his versation agreeable to his taste: he is almost the designs. As this is the end of the passions in ge end of my devotions; half my prayers are for his neral, so it is particularly of ambition, which pushes happiness-I love to talk of him, and never hear the soul to such actions as are apt to procure ho him named but with pleasure and emotion. I am nour and reputation to the actor. But if we carry your friend, and wish you happiness; but am sorry our reflections higher, we may discover further to see by the air of your letter, that there are a set ends of Providence in implanting this passion is of women who are got into the common-place mankind. raillery of every thing that is sober, decent, and It was necessary for the world, that arts should proper: matrimony and the clergy are the topics be invented and improved, books written and tratt of people of little wit, and no understanding. I mitted to posterity, nations conquered and civi own to you, I have learned of the vicar's wife all lized. Now since the proper and genuine motives |
