Then jogs his neighbour, as the wonder strike him, his Shakspeare! Shakspeare!-Oh, there's nothing like him! this night's various and enchanted cup e five long acts, from which our three are taken, CALAMITIES OF AUTHORSHIP. 4 GARRICK. There are three difficulties in authorship;-to write thing worth the publishing—to find honest men publish it-and to get sensible men to read it. rature has now become a game; in which the sellers are the kings; the critics, the knaves; public, the pack; and the poor author, the mere =, or thing played upon. DESCRIPTION OF LOVE. -And I, forsooth, in love! I, that have been ry beadle to a humorous sigh: prince of plackets, king of codpieces, ear his colours like a tumbler's hoop! I! I love! I sue! I seek a wife! A woman, that is like a German clock, ASTROLOGY. This is the excellent foppery of the world! that when we are sick in fortune (often the surfeit of our own behaviour,) we make guilty of our disasters, the sun, the moon, and the stars: as if we were villains by necessity; fools by heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards, liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obein, by a divine thrusting on: An admirable evasion dience of planetary influence; and all that we are evil of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish disposition to the charge of a star! My father compounded with was under ursa major; so that it follows, I am rough my mother under the dragon's tail; and my nativity and lecherous.-Tut, I should have been that I am, had the maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled at my bastardizing. VARIOUS KINDS OF GOODNESS. Whatever diversity of opinions may prevail respecting goodness in general, few people disallow the marks of this valuable quality, as they are found to exist in particular bodies of men, or in certain individuals; and, perhaps, an enumeration of these traits may include every thing new that can be well said on the subject. A good king, for example, is one who has the gift of pleasing both the ins and the outs; and who, not being permitted to do any thing, is able to do every thing. A good minister is one who is capable of conducting the affairs of a great nation, without levying any taxes on the public. A good patriot is one who possesses excellent lungs, and is not afraid of availing himself of the freedom of speech, allowed in parliament, to abuse every person, and oppose every measure, till he makes action of the Winter's Tale, as written by Shakspeare, the situation of an upright minister sufficiently un aends sixteen years. comfortable to force him to a resignation; when he seizes on his place, and actually performs himself the very part which he had impudently and wrongfully accused his predecessor of acting. their servants gratis, till he has fully establ himself in snug practice; after which, he soon leaves off all gratis prescriptions, and resigns in favo some pupil who is capable of complimenting him with A good magistrate is one who takes care to keep a few hundreds for so excellent an opportunity of the price of bread as low as possible without regard-following his steps, and obtaining both the character ing any advance in that of flour, for the sake of esta- and emoluments of a good physician. blishing his character among the vulgar, whom he is wise enough to know are the bulk of mankind. This knowledge, and these motives, lead him also to make an example, once or twice in his life, of some honest butcher, baker, or publican, if any such beings should chance to reside in his district, for accidentally selling short weight or measure: and he seldom or never commits any one to prison; except, to please his patron, some poor fellow who has killed a hare, a pheasant, or a partridge. A good divine is one who preaches short sermons remarkably loud, and who not only permits his parishioners to pursue, at their pleasure, whoring, drinking, feasting, gambling, and swearing, without receiving the smallest intimation of the impropriety of their conduct; but who himself actuaily joins them, on every convenient occasion, in the practice of these innocent amusements. A good lawyer is one who knows how to browbeat timid witnesses, and to rouse the feelings, and enlarge on the vast consequence of silly jurymen, (who always look wisest when they are in reality the greatest fools,) so as to procure a verdict for his client, though honesty and integrity are in consequence doomed to starve in prison. A good man, generally speaking, is one who now and then gives his poor neighbours and dependent very small portion of what he has previously ab from their labour, for which he paid them so scantily that they might well became proper objects in the eye of real benevolence. A very good man subscribes about twenty guineas a year to a desen e more different hospitals and charity-schools; which he contrives to send necessitous relations, might otherwise be more burdensome. With to the general conduct in life of a good mas, only necessary that he has never been publicly ka to have committed any action remarkably bad A good man, in the commercial world, is one who has money enough to answer all demands; and wi knowing he must pay bills when due, or be hair a personal inconveniencies, and particularly to pay yers' and bailiffs' fees, takes care to discharge all pecuniary obligations. N. B. It is of tot importance by what means he acquires the abse effect this solely necessary purpose; and thoug be a grinder of the poor, a defrauder of the r base guardian of orphans, a Jew usurer, or a dra miser, still he is a good man in the city, he can pay every one twenty shillings in the of what they can prove to be their due. A good physician is one who, having no real business to employ him, generously begins life with giv- A good citizen is one who jogs on quiedy the ing his advice to the poor gratis: at the same time life, pays scot and lot without ever inqu taking care to direct all his prescriptions to some what, and never attends common halls, want honest apothecary, who allows him thirty per cent. vestry meetings, but submits quietly to t on the price of the medicines. If this fails to procure pocket picked by those who do; always thong him better practice, he engages his friends to institute the presence of one more, and him clearly a public dispensary, and appoint him the physician; weight or consequence, whatever natural rat when, to ingratiate himself with the principal sub-he may possess, would make no material die scribers, by great apparent humanity, and of course to secure their own private custom, he engages to attend A good friend is one who procures a mat comfortable post under government, to resist ho THE LAUGHING PHILOSOPHER. aking provision for the large family he has provided m, by debauching his wife, daughter, or sister. A good fellow is one who borrows money of all e persons who are weak enough to trust him, hout ever giving himself the smallest concern ut repayment, which he spends freely, or gives y, during the little time it lasts; and who ruins e girls, drinks more liquor, sings more songs, gives e toasts, belongs to more drunken societies, and up more nights, than any other person whatever. B. When he happens to have in possession a good of property of his own, he is, while it lasts, lly and emphatically called, a good fellow: but his money and credit are both exhausted, so he is obliged to sing, drink and tell stories, for entertainment of those who pay his shot, he derates into a good companion. good husband is one who never opposes his s inclinations, or arraigns her conduct, however rd or unreasonable. good wife is one who never opposes her hus's inclinations, or arraigns his conduct, however dor unreasonable. Lere are, besides these, a variety of other good the characteristics of whom will readily occur ost readers, though no extraordinary quantity ng models have perhaps lately appeared: such od generals, good admirals, good authors, good 5, good critics, and a variety of others. But pecimens already produced will abundantly that the world is not so destitute of goodness ne pretended moralists have dared to insinuate. RELIGION. will wrangle for religion; write for it; fight die for it; any thing but-live for it. ANCESTRAL ENORMITIES. ze thousand years, if I count right, Virgil, who sang of war and farming, Though Cæsar spoke him well: Such wondrous tales to tell. I'm really puzzled to proceed ;— So with the ancients let's have done, One more-that Esop-was there ever!- But with the moderns shall we gain? A mere upholsterer got Moliere, And What's-his-name made jugs. Rousseau (not Jacques, but Jean Baptiste) Whose odes to read are quite a feast His ancestor made shoes : And is not Jaques himself as bad, We'll find the bad turn'd worse; Some folks affirm the proof is full, For, though one scorns in fleece to deal, 'Twould his poor son disgrace. I'm glad to find there is a doubt But whispers go, that Chaucer's father A vintner was-or cobbler rather Hence his French name-Chaucier. Who views the world, must loathe his kind; Nought then remains, but hope-which still Close to the box's bottom : And, after all, the hazard runs, EXTRACT FROM THE WILL OF AN EARL OF Imprimis. For my soul, I confess, I have heard very much of souls, but what they are, or who they are, or what they are for, God knows, I know not; they tell me now of another world, where I never was, nor do I know one foot of the way thither. While the king stood, I was of his religion, made my son wear a cassock, and thought to make him a bishop; but then came the Scots and made me a presbyterian; and since Cromwell entered I have been an independent. These, I believe, are the kingdom's three estates, and if any of these can save a soul, I may claim one; therefore if my executors do find I have a soul, I give it to him who gave it to me. Item.-I give my body, for I cannot keep it, to be * Some give it for the wool-merchant, others for the butcher. buried. Do not lay me in the church porch, fr was a lord, and would not be buried where Co Pride was born. Item.-My will is, that I have no monument, then I must have epitaphs and verses, and all my 2 long I had too much of them. Item.-I give all my deer to the Earl of Sa who I know will preserve them, because be the king a buck out of one of his own parks Item.-I give nothing to Lord Say; whi I give him because I know he will bestow poor. Item.-To Tom May I give 5s. I intende more; but whoever has seen his History of the P liament, thinks 5s. too much. Item. I give Lieutenant-Colonel Cromwel word of mine, because hitherto he never t own. Item. I give up the ghost.-Concordet can ginali. EGAN AND CURRAN. In the election for the borough of Tallagi, Jólar Egan was an unsuccessful candidate-be, bow appealed from the decision, and the appeal course before a committee of the House of Ca It was in the heat of a very warm summer, Ewa struggling through the crowd, his handkerchea hand, his wig in the other, and his whole consumes raging like the dogstar, when he met Cum sorry for you, my dear fellow," said Curran S why so, Jack-why so?-I'm perfectly s: my -"Alas, Egan, it's but too visible to every you're losing tallow (Tallagh) fast." SIC VITA. Like to the falling of a star, The wind blows out; the bubble dies; The spring entomb'd in autumn lies; The dew dries up; the star is shot: The flight is past, and man forgot. ON A FAT MAN. If fat men ride, they tire the horse, And if they walk, themselves-that's worse: Travel at all, they are at best, Either oppressors-or opprest. VOYAGE TO TARTARUS. remember-not a 'pothecary But one warm evening when well fill'd with drink, d having found my wine too hot to carry, laid myself most merry in a sink ; d there when Somnus plac'd his leaden hand ether they issued from the iron gate, Of which my gentle reader need not doubt, -joyful sailor, from the mast-head high, houted aloud "Hell, we're in sight of Hell!" Hell," says the helmsman, turning up his eye, Cheerly, my lads, a pleasant breeze, all's well." "Hell," says the captain, "keep an eye a-head, Clew up the topsails, 'tis a steady gale, Watch well your soundings-damn you, heave the lead Jack, north north-east ;-Jem, yonder pilot hail, And Jack, I say, hide the run brandy well, Gaugers are devils on earth-what must they be in Hell?" [Three or four stanzas are omitted here, describing the coast in the manner of the voyage to Loo Choo.] There was Azazel, drunk as any lord, His mast-high standard flagging in his hand; Belphegor, too, like him of Perigord, Limp'd nimbly up and down along the strand, As decent people as I ever spied. Glad was my soul, and straight I cock'd my ear. The style of modern Hell was most absurd; And then to write a learn'd convincing letter, To prove their ancient music was much better. But I shall speak the truth and shame the devil, Although from Hell I've only made a sortieFor I must say their playing was not evil, And savoured more of accent than of forte. Such as of yore they play'd in ancient Greece, When old Timotheus tickled Alexander, And I was much delighted with a piece, Droned on the bag-pipes by a Salamander. Besides when asked which concord had most worth The fourth or fifth? they all sung out the fourth! [The remaining stanzas contain remarks on the Literature and State of the Fine Arts in Hell, Stage |