on trifles spear. No 248. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1711. value 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 trious, preserve the portion of the helpless infant, and raise the head of the mourning father., People Hoc maxime officii est, ut quisque maxime opis indigeat, ita ei their neighbourhood, and give work to the induspotissimum opitulari. TUL. that the tong It is a principal point of duty, to assist another most, when he whose hearts are wholly bent towards pleasure, or e faster the lesser ns soever may le, I think the who after orator told 3 stands most in need of assistance. intent upon gain, never hear of the noble occur. rences among men of industry and humanity. It THERE are none who deserve superiority over would look like a city romance, to tell them of others in the esteem of mankind, who do not make the generous merchant, who the other day sent this it their endeavour to be beneficial to society; and billet to an eminent trader under difficulties to sup. who upon all occasions which their circumstances port himself, in whose fall many hundreds besides of life can administer, do not take a certain un- himself had perished: but because I think there is feigned pleasure in conferring benefits of one kind more spirit and true gallantry in it than in any or other. Those whose great talents and high birth letter I have ever read from Strephon to Phillis, I dof The W have placed them in conspicuous stations of life shall insert it even in the mercantile honest style remarkable are indispensably obliged to exert some noble in-in which it was sent : very glad the a moment's made. descripten ells us, that not forbear had cut e tre on the et sond ith pain CROXAL g withers clinations for the service of the world; or else SIR, W. S.'* women's tags such advantages become misfortunes, and shade. I HAVE heard of the casualties which have inand privacy are a more eligible portion. Where volved you in extreme distress at this time: and opportunities and inclinations are given to the same person, we sometimes see sublime instances knowing you to be a man of great good-nature, of virtue, which so dazzle our imaginations, that industry, and probity, have resolved to stand by was cut out, we look with scorn on all which in lower scenes of you. Be of good cheer; the bearer brings with life we may ourselves be able to practise. But this him five thousand pounds, and has my order to anis a vicious way of thinking; and it bears some I did this in haste, for fear I should come too late swer your drawing as much more on my account. spice of romantic madness, for a man to imagine for your relief; but you may value yourself with that he must grow ambitious, or seek adventures, to be able to do great actions. It is in every very cheerfully run the hazard of being so much me to the sum of fifty thousand pounds; for I can man's power in the world who is above mere po- less rich than I am now, to save an honest man verty, not only to do things worthy, but heroic. whom I love. The great foundation of civil virtue is self-denial; "Your friend and servant, and there is no one above the necessities of life, but has opportunities of exercising that noble quality, and doing as much as his circumstances I think there is somewhere in Montaigne† menwill bear for the ease and convenience of other tion made of a family-book, wherein all the ocmen; and he who does more than ordinary men currences that happened from one generation of practise upon such occasions as occur in his life, that house to another were recorded. Were there deserves the value of his friends, as if he had done such a method in the families which are concerned It had enterprises which are usually attended with the in this generosity, it would be an hard task for the highest glory. Men of public spirit differ rather in greatest in Europe to give in their own, an instance their circumstances than their virtue; and the man of a benefit better placed, or conferred with a who does all he can, in a low station, is more a hero how barbarous and inhuman is any unjust step more graceful air. It has been heretofore urged, than he who omits any worthy action he is able to made to the disadvantage of a trader and by accomplish in a great one. It is not many years how much such an act towards him is detestable, ago since Lapirius, in wrong of his elder brother, by so much an act of kindness towards him is laudcame to a great estate by gift of his father, by reason of the dissolute behaviour of the first-born. Shame able. I remember to have heard a bencher of the and contrition reformed the life of the disinherited Temple tell a story of a tradition in their house, youth, and he became as remarkable for his good for such a season, and allowing him his expenses where they had formerly a custom of choosing kings qualities as formerly for his errors. Lapirius, who observed his brother's amendment, sent him, on said my friend, carried his royal inclination a little at the charge of the society. One of our kings,§ new-year's day in the morning, the following letter: too far, and there was a committee ordered to look into the management of his treasury. Among other IINCLOSE to you the deeds whereby my father things it appeared, that his majesty walking incog. gave me this house and land. Had he lived till in the cloister, had overheard a poor man say to now, he would not have bestowed it in that man- another, Such a small sum would make me the ner; he took it from the man you were, and I re-happiest man in the world.' The king, out of his store it to the man you are. are many admirable buffoons that animadvert upon every single defect in another, without ever dis No 249. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1711. covering the least beauty of their own. By this means, these unlucky little wits often gain reputa. tion in the esteem of vulgar minds, and raise themselves above persons of much more laudable cha racters. If the talent of ridicule were employed to laugh men out of vice and folly, it might be of some use to the world; but instead of this, we find that it is generally made use of to laugh men out of virtue and good sense, by attacking every thing that is solemn and serious, decent and praise-worthy, in human life. 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 con- We may observe, that in the first ages of the sider laughter and ridicule in my present paper. world, when the great souls and master-pieces of Man is the merriest species of the creation; all human nature were produced, men shined by a above and below him are serious. He sees things noble simplicity of behaviour, and were strangers in a different light from other beings, and finds his to those little embellishments which are so fashion. mirth arising from objects that perhaps cause some-able in our present conversation. And it is very thing like pity or displeasure in higher natures. remarkable, that notwithstanding we fall short at Laughter is indeed a very good counterpoise to the present of the ancients in poetry, painting, oratory, spleen; and it seems but reasonable that we should history, architecture, and all the noble arts and be capable of receiving joy from what is no real sciences which depend more upon genius than exgood to us, since we can receive grief from what perience, we exceed them as much in doggrel, is no real evil. humour, burlesque, and all the trivial arts of ridiI have in my forty-seventh paper raised a specu-cule. We meet with more raillery among the mo lation on the notion of a modern philosopher, who derns, but more good sense among the ancients. describes the first motive of laughter to be a secret The two great branches of ridicule in writing comparison which we make between ourselves and are comedy and burlesque. The first ridicules the persons we laugh at; or, in other words, that persons by drawing them in their proper charac satisfaction which we receive from the opinion of ters, the other by drawing them quite unlike themsome pre-eminence in ourselves, when we see the selves. Burlesque is therefore of two kinds; absurdities of another, or when we reflect on any first represents mean persons in the accoutrements past absurdities of our own. This seems to hold of heroes; the other describes great persons acting in most cases, and we may observe that the vainest and speaking like the basest among the people. part of mankind are the most addicted to this Don Quixote is an instance of the first, and Lupassion. cian's gods of the second. It is a dispute among the I have read a sermon of a conventual in the the critics, whether burlesque poetry runs best in church of Rome, on those words of the wise man, heroic verse, like that of the Dispensary; or in I said of laughter, it is mad; and of mirth, what doggrel, like that of Hudibras. I think, where does it? Upon which he laid it down as a point of the low character is to be raised, the heroic is the doctrine, that laughter was the effect of original proper measure; but when a hero is to be pulled sin, and that Adam could not laugh before the fall, down and degraded, it is done best in doggrel. If Hudibras had been set out with as much wit Laughter, while it lasts, slackens and unbraces the mind, weakens the faculties, and causes a kind and humour in heroic verse as he is in doggrel, he of remissness and dissolution in all the powers of would have made a much more agreeable figure the soul; and thus far it may be looked upon as a than he does; though the generality of his readers weakness in the composition of human nature. But are so wonderfully pleased with the double if we consider the frequent reliefs we receive rhimes, that I do not expect many will be of my from it, and how often it breaks the gloom which opinion in this particular. is apt to depress the mind and damp our spirits, I shall conclude this essay upon laughter with with transient unexpected gleams of joy, one observing, that the metaphor of laughing, applied would take care not to grow too wise for so great to fields and meadows when they are in flower, or to trees when they are in blossom, runs through all a pleasure of life. The talent of turning men into ridicule, and ex-languages; which I have not observed of any other posing to laughter those one converses with, is the metaphor, excepting that of fire and burning when qualification of little ungenerous tempers. A they are applied to love. This shows that we nayoung man with this cast of mind cuts himself off turally regard laughter, as what is in itself both from all manner of improvement. Every one has his amiable and beautiful. For this reason likewise flaws and weaknesses; nay, the greatest blemishes Venus has gained the title of quedas, the te are often found in the most shining characters; but laughter-loving dame,' as Waller has translated it, what an absurd thing is it to pass over all the va- and is represented by Horace as the goddess who luable parts of a man, and fix our attention on his delights in laughter. Milton, in a joyous assembly infirmities? to observe his imperfections more than of imaginary persons, has given us a very poetical his virtues? and to make use of him for the sport figure of laughter. His whole band of mirth is so of others, rather than for our improvement? finely described, that I shall set down the passage at length: We therefore very often find, that persons the most accomplished in ridicule are those who are very shrewd in hitting a blot, without exerting any thing masterly in themselves. As there are many eminent critics who never writ a good line, there * Hobbes. But come thou goddess fair and free, Il the m upon gene. as much t he tonal aillery mong the f ridicule The their pro m quite 250. Haste thee nymph, and bring with the Quips, and cranks, and wanton wiles, And in thy right hand lead with thee To live with her, and live with thee, ADDISON. SPECTATOR. C. No 250. MONDAY, DECEMBER 17, 1711. Disce docendus adhuc, quæ censet amiculus, ut si HOR. Ep. xvii. 1. 1. ver. 3. MR. SPECTATOR, You see the nature of my request by the Latin motto which I address to you. I am very sensible I ought not to use many words to you, who are one of but few; but the following piece as it relates to e of two speculation, in propriety of speech, being a curin the c osity in its kind, begs your patience. It was found greater in a poetical virtuoso's closet among his rarities; among and since the several treatises of thumbs, ears, and the fix-noses, have obliged the world, this of eyes, is at is a disp your service. poetry s ero is to estiv with ag with 295 placed betwixt two opposite looking-glasses, and so took a sort of retrospective cast at one view. Copies of this double-faced way are not yet out of fashion with many professions, and the ingenious artists pretend to keep up this species by doubleheaded canes and spoons; but there is no mark of this faculty, except in the emblematical way of a wise general having an eye to both front and rear, or a pious man taking a review and prospect of his past and future state at the same time. "I must own, that the names, colours, qualities, and turns of eyes, vary almost in every head; for, not to mention the common appellations of the black, the blue, the white, the grey, and the like; the most remarkable are those that borrow their titles from animals, by virtue of some particular quality of resemblance they bear to the eyes of the respective creatures; as that of a greedy rapacious aspect takes its name from the cat, that of a sharp piercing nature from the hawk, those of an amorous roguish look derive their title even from the sheep, and we say such a one has a sheep's eye, not so much to denote the innocence as the simple slyness of the cast. Nor is this metaphorical inoculation a modern invention, for we find Homer taking the freedom to place the eye of an ox, bull, or cow, in one of his principal goddesses, by that frequent expression of Βοοπις πότνια Ηρ "The ox-ey'd venerable Juno.' "Now as to the peculiar qualities of the eye, that fine part of our constitution seems as much the receptacle and seat of our passions, appetites, and inclinations, as the mind itself; and at least it is the outward portal to introduce them to the house within, or rather the common thoroughfare to let our affections pass in and out. Love, anger, Disp❝The first eye of consequence (under the invisi-pride, and avarice, all visibly move in those little ble Author of all) is the visible luminary of the orbs. I know a young lady that cannot see a certhe universe. This glorious Spectator is said never to tain gentleman pass by without showing a secret open his eyes at his rising in a morning, without desire of seeing him again by a dance in her eyehaving a whole kingdom of adorers in Persian balls; nay, she cannot, for the heart of her, help silk waiting at his levee. Millions of creatures de-looking half a street's length after any man in a gay eistrive their sight from this original, who, besides his dress. You cannot behold a covetous spirit walk being the great director of optics, is the surest test by a goldsmith's shop, without casting a wishful eye f whether eyes be of the same species with that of at the heaps upon the counter. Does not a haughty an eagle, or that of an owl. The one he emboldens person show the temper of his soul in the supercili with a manly assurance to look, speak, act, or ous roll of his eye? and how frequently, in the plead before the faces of a numerous assembly; height of passion, does that moving picture in our the other he dazzles out of countenance into a head start and stare, gather a redness and quick sheepish dejectedness. The sun-proof eye dares lashes of lightning, and make all its humours up a dance in a full court; and without sparkle with fire, as Virgil finely describes it, blinking at the lustre of beauty, can distribute an eye of proper complaisance to a room crowded with company, each of which deserves particular regard; while the other sneaks from conversation, like a fearful debtor who never dares to look out, but when he can see nobody, and nobody him. "The next instance of optics is the famous Argus, who (to speak the language of Cambridge) was one of a hundred; and being used as a spy in "As for the various turns of the eye-sight, such the affairs of jealousy, was obliged to have all his whole leer, I shall not enter into a very particular as the voluntary or involuntary, the half or the eyes about him. We have no account of the par- account of them; but let me observe, that oblique ticular colours, casts, and turns of this body of eyes; but as he was pimp for his mistress Juno, it vision, when natural, was anciently the mark of is probable he used all the modern leers, sly glances, day it is a malignant ill look; but when it is forced bewitchery and magical fascination, and to this and other ocular activities, to serve his purpose and affected, it carries a wanton design, and in Some look upon him as the then king at arms to the heathenish deities; and make no more of his playhouses, and other public places, this ocular eyes than of so many spangles of his herald's coat intimation is often an assignation for bad prac"The next upon the optic list is old Janus, who in the handies, as a double face, one of the twelve apostles, &c. Many old-fashioned spoons have ornamental figures carved stood in a double-sighted capacity, like a person &c. lead 66 - Ardentis ab ore Scintillæ absistunt: oculis micat acribus ignis.” En. xii. ver. 101. "From his wide nostril flies DRYDEN. tices. But this irregularity in vision, together with the sounds of larks and nightingales, with all the such enormities as tipping the wink, the circum-music of the fields and woods. I have lately respective roll, the side-peep through a thin hood or ceived a letter from some very odd fellow upon this fan, must be put in the class of heteroptics, as all subject, which I shall leave with my reader, with wrong notions of religion are ranked under the ge-out saying any thing further of it. neral name of heterodox. All the pernicious applications of sight are more immediately under the direction of a Spectator; and I hope you will arm your readers against the mischiefs which are daily done by killing eyes, in which you will highly oblige your wounded unknown friend, 66 T. B. 'SIR, I AM a man out of all business, and would wil lingly turn my head to any thing for an honest livelihood. I have invented several projects for rais ing many millions of money without burdening the subject, but I cannot get the parliament to listen to me, who look upon me, forsooth, as a crack, and a projector; so that despairing to enrich either You professed in several papers, your particular myself or my country by this public-spiritedness, I endeavours in the province of Spectator, to cor- would make some proposals to you relating to a rect the offences committed by Starers, who dis-design which I have very much at heart, and which turb whole assemblies without any regard to time, may procure me a handsome subsistence, if you place, or modesty. You complained also, that a will be pleased to recommend it to the cities of Starer is not usually a person to be convinced by London and Westminster. " MR. SPECTATOR, the reason of the thing, nor so easily rebuked as to 'The post I would aim at, is to be comptroller. amend by admonitions. I thought, therefore, fit general of the London Cries, which are at present to acquaint you with a convenient mechanical way, under no manner of rules or discipline. I think I which may easily prevent or correct staring, by an am pretty well qualified for this place, as being a optical contrivance of new perspective-glasses, man of very strong lungs, of great insight into all short and commodious like opera-glasses, fit for the branches of our British trades and manufac short-sighted people as well as others, these glasses tures, and of a competent skill in music. making the objects appear either as they are seen 'The Cries of London may be divided into vocal by the naked eye, or more distinct, though some-and instrumental. As for the latter, they are at what less than life, or bigger and nearer. A per-present under a very great disorder. A freeman son may, by the help of this invention, take a view of London has the privilege of disturbing a whole of another without the impertinence of staring; at street for an hour together, with the twanking of a the same time, it shall not be possible to know brass kettle or a frying pan. whom or what he is looking at. One may look to- thump at midnight startles us in our beds, as much wards his right or left hand, when he is supposed as the breaking in of a thief. The sowgelder's to look forwards. This is set forth at large in the horn has indeed something musical in it, but this is printed proposals for the sale of these glasses, to seldom heard within the liberties. I would there be had at Mr. Dillon's in Long-acre, next door to fore propose, that no instrument of this nature the White Hart. Now, sir, as your Spectator has should be made use of, which I have not tuned and occasioned the publishing of this invention for the licensed, after having carefully examined in what benefit of modest spectators, the inventor desires manner it may affect the ears of her majesty's liege your admonitions concerning the decent use of it; subjects. The watchman's and hopes, by your recommendation, that for the Vocal cries are of a much larger extent, and future, beauty may be beheld without the torture indeed so full of incongruities and barbarisms, that and confusion which it suffers from the insolence we appear a distracted city to foreigners, who do of Starers. By this means you will relieve the in-not comprehend the meaning of such enormous out. nocent from an insult which there is no law to cries. Milk is generally sold in a note above E-la, punish, though it is a greater offence than many which are within the cognizance of justice. 'I am, SIR, "Your most humble servant, No 251. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1711. Linguæ centum sunt, oraque centum. Ferrea vex VIRG. Æn. vi. ver. 625. A hundred mouths, a hundred tongues, And throats of brass inspir'd with iron lungs. DRYDEN. and in sounds so exceeding shrill, that it often sets our teeth on edge. The chimney-sweeper is con fined to no certain pitch; he sometimes utters him. self in the deepest base, and sometimes in the sharpest treble; sometimes in the highest, and Q. sometimes in the lowest note of the gamut. The same observation might be made on the retailers of small-coal, not to mention broken glasses, or brickdust. In these, therefore, and the like cases, it should be my care to sweeten and mellow the voices of these itinerant tradesmen, before they make their appearance in our streets, as also to accom modate their cries to their respective wares; and to take care in particular, that those may not make the most noise who have the least to sell, which is very observable in the venders of card-matches, to whom I cannot but apply that old proverb of "Much cry, but little wool." THERE is nothing which more astonishes a foreigner, and frights a country squire, than the Cries of London. My good friend Sir Roger, often de. clares, that he cannot get them out of his head, or go to sleep for them, the first week that he is in On the contrary, Will Honeycomb calls them the ramage de la ville, and prefers them to town. • Said to have been written by a Mr. Golding. See No. 252. 'Some of these last-mentioned musicians are so very loud in the sale of these trifling manufactures, that an honest splenetic gentleman of my acquaintance bargained with one of them never to come into the street where he lived. But what was the effect of this contract? Why, the whole tribe of card-match-makers which frequent that quarter, passed by his door the very next day, in hopes of being bought off after the same manner. ghtingales ods. I have ryodd fel with my er of it siness, and hing for a veral proje without le parlane forsooth, a airing to et public to You nd it to the 251. It is another great imperfection in our London, commonly known by the name of the Colly-M Cries, that there is no just time nor measure ob- Puff*; and such as is at this day the vender served in them. Our news should indeed be pub-powder and wash-balls, who, if I am rightly inlished in a very quick time, because it is a com- formed, goes under the name of Powder Watt. modity that will not keep cold. It should not, however, be cried with the same precipitation as which runs through this whole vociferous genera'I must not here omit one particular absurdity fire. Yet this is generally the case. A bloody tion, and which renders their cries very often not battle alarms the town from one end to another in only incommodious, but altogether useless to the an instant. Every motion of the French is pub-public. I mean, that idle accomplishment which lished in so great a hurry, that one would think they all of them aim at, of crying so as not to be the enemy were at our gates. This likewise I understood. Whether or no they have learned this would take upon me to regulate in such a manner, from several of our affected singers, I will not take that there should be some distinction made be. upon me to say; but most certain it is, that people tween the spreading of a victory, a march, or an know the wares they deal in rather by their tunes encampment, a Dutch, a Portugal, or a Spanish than by their words; insomuch that I have somemail. Nor must I omit under this head those ex-times seen a country boy run out to buy apples of chat hecessive alarms with which several boisterous rustics a bellows-mender, and ginger-bread from a grinder infest our streets in turnip-season; and which are of knives and scissors. Nay, so strangely infatuatmore inexcusable, because these are wares which ed are some very eminent artists of this particular are in no danger of cooling upon their hands. grace in a cry, that none but their acquaintance 'There are others who affect a very slow time, are able to guess at their profession; for who else which are and are in my opinion much more tuneable than can know, that "work if I had it," should be the the former. The cooper in particular swells his signification of a corn-cutter? iscipline "last note in an hollow voice, that is not without its Forasmuch, therefore, as persons of this rank his place harmony; nor can I forbear being inspired with a are seldom men of genius or capacity, I think it most agreeable melancholy, when I hear that sad would be very proper that some man of good sense and solemn air with which the public are very often and sound judgment should preside over these asked, if they have any chairs to mend? Your own public cries, who should permit none to lift up memory may suggest to you many other lamenta- their voices in our streets, that have not tunable ble ditties of the same nature, in which the music throats, and are not only able to overcome the sorder is wonderfully languishing and melodious. noise of the crowd, and the rattling of coaches, but I am always pleased with that particular time also to vend their respective merchandises in apt of the year which is proper for the pickling of dill phrases, and in the most distinct and agreeable and cucumbers; but, alas! this cry, like the song sounds. I do therefore humbly recommend myself of the nightingale, is not heard above two months as a person rightly qualified for this post; and if I It would therefore be worth while to consider, meet with fitting encouragement, shall communicalin whether the same air might not in some cases be cate some other projects which I have by me, that adapted to other words. may no less conduce to the emolument of the public. 'I am, SIR, &c. RALPH CROTCHET.' C. is to be c great rades and Vin rost De divided latter, t 'sturb h the w The The ent of ave t ADDISON. It might likewise deserve our most serious consideration, how far, in a well regulated city, those exhumorists are to be tolerated, who, not contented or with the traditional cries of their forefathers, have invented particular songs and tunes of their own: Lauron, del. P. Tempest, exc, as we learn from Grainger's Biosuch as was, not many years since, the pastry-man, graphical History of England. • There is a print of this man in the Set of London Cries, M. ૨૬ |
