• this Darling, that I feldom fee any of my Friends, am * uneafie in all Companies till I fee her again; and when ⚫ I come home, fhe is in the Dumps, because the fays the is fure I came fo foon only because I think her handfome. I dare not upon this Occafion laugh; but tho' I am one of the warmest Churchmen in the Kingdom, I am forced to rail at the Times, because she is a violent Whig. Upon this we talk Politicks fo long, that fhe is convinc'd I kifs her for her Wisdom. It is a common Practice with me to ask her fome Question concerning ⚫ the Constitution, which the answers me in general out • of Harington's Oceana: Then I commend her ftrange Memory, and her Arm is immediately locked in mine. While I keep her in this Temper fhe plays before me, ⚫ fometimes dancing in the midst of the Room, fometimes ftriking an Air at her Spinnet, varying her Pofture, and her Charms in fuch a manner that I am in ⚫ continual Pleasure: She will play the Fool if I allow her to be wife, but if the fufpects I like her for her Trifling, the immediately grows grave.

THESE are the Toils in which I am taken, and I carry off my Servitude, as well as most Men; but my Application to you is in behalf of the Hen-peckt in general, and I defire a Differtation from you in Defence of us. You have, as I am informed, very good Authorities in our Favour, and hope you will not omit the mention of the Renowned Socrates, and his Philofophick Refignation to his Wife Xantippe. This would be a very good Office to the World in general, for the Hen-peckt are powerful in their Quality and Numbers, not only in Cities but in Courts; in the latter they are ever the most obfequious, in the former the most wealthy of all Men. When you have confidered Wedlock throughly, you ought to enter into the Suburbs of Matrimony, and give us an Account of the Thraldom of kind Keepers and irrefolute Lovers; the Keepers who cannot quit their Fair Ones tho' they fee their approaching Ruin; the Lovers who dare not marry, tho' they know they fhall never be happy without the Miftreffes whom they cannot purchase on other Terms.

WHAT

WHAT will be a great Embellishment to your Difcourfe, will be, that you may find Inftances of the Haughty, the Proud, the Frolick, the Stubborn, who are each of them in fecret downright Slaves to their • Wives or Miftreffes. I must beg of you in the last Place to dwell upon this, That the Wife and Valiant in all Ages have been Hen-peckt; and that the turdy Tempers 'who are not Slaves to Affection, owe that Exemption to their being enthralled by Ambition, Avarice, or fome ' meaner Paffion. I have ten thoufand Things more to fay, but my Wife fees me Writing, and will, according to Cuftom, be confulted, if I do not feal this immedi ⚫ately.

T

Yours,

Nathaniel Henrooft

N° 177. Saturday, September 22.

1

Quis enim bonus, aut face dignus

Arcand, qualem Cereris vult effe facerdos,
Ulla aliena fibi credat mala?

Juv.

None of my laft Week's Papers I treated of GoodNature, as it is the Effect of Conftitution; I fhall now fpeak of it as it is a Moral Virtue. The first may make a Man cafy in himself and agreeable to others, but implies no Merit in him that is poffeffed of it. A Man is no more to be praised upon this Account, than because he has a regular Pulfe or a good Digeftion. This Good-Nature however in the Conftitution, which Mr. Dryden fomewhere calls a Milkiness of Blood, is an admirable Groundwork for the other. In order therefore to try our Good-Nature, whether it arifes from the Body or the Mind, whether it be founded in the Animal or Rational Part of our Nature, in a Word, whether it be fuch as is entitled to any other Reward, befides that fecret Satisfaction and Contentment of Mind which is effential to

it, and the kind Reception it procures us in the World, we must examine it by the following Rules.

FIRST, Whether it acts with Steddiness and Uniformity in Sickness and in Health, in Profperity and in Adverfity; if otherwife, it is to be looked upon as ncthing else but an Irradiation of the Mind from fome new Supply of Spirits, or a more kindly Circulation of the Blood. Sir Francis Bacon mentions a cunning Sollicitor, who would never ask a Favour of a great Man before Dinner; but took Care to prefer his Petition at a Time when the Party petitioned had his Mind free from Care, and his Appetites in good Humour. Such a tranfient temporary Good-Nature as this, is not that Philanthropie, that Love of Mankind, which deferves the Title of a Moral Virtue.

THE next way of a Man's bringing his Good-Nature to the Teft, is, to confider whether it operates according to the Rules of Reafon and Duty: For if, notwithstanding its general Benevolence to Mankind, it makes no Diftinction between its Objects, if it exerts it felf promiscuoufly towards the Deferving and the Undeferving, if it relieves alike the Idle and the Indigent, if it gives it felf up to the firft Petitioner, and lights upon any other rather by Accident than Choice, it may pafs for an amiable Instinct, but muft not affume the Name of a Moral Virtue.

THE Third Tryal of Good-Nature will be, the examining our felves, whether or no we are able to exert it to our own Disadvantage, and employ it on proper Objects, notwithstanding any little Pain, Want, or Inconvenience which may arife to our felves from it: In a Word, whe ther we are willing to rifque any Part of our Fortune, our Reputation, our Health or Eafe, for the Benefit of Mankind. Among all these Expreffions of Good-Nature, I fhall fingle out that which goes under the general Name of Charity, as it confifts in relieving the Indigent; that being a Tryal of this Kind which offers it felf to us almost at all Times and in every Place.

I fhould propofe it as a Rule to every one, who is provided with any Competency of Fortune more than fufficient for the Neceffaries of Life, to lay afide a certain

Pro

Proportion of his Income for the Ufe of the Poor. This I would look upon as an Offering to him who has a Right to the Whole, for the Ufe of those whom, in the paffage hereafter mentioned, he has described as his own Reprefentatives upon Earth. At the fame Time we should manage our Charity with fuch Prudence and Caution, that we may not hurt our own Friends or Relations, whilst we are doing Good to those who are Strangers to us.

THIS may poffibly be explained better by an Example than by a Rule.

EUGENIUS is a Man of an univerfal Good-Nature,' and generous beyond the Extent of his Fortune; but withal fo prudent in the Occonomy of his Affairs, that what goes out in Charity is made up by good Management. Eugenius has what the World calls Two hundred Pounds a Year; but never values himself above Ninescore, as not thinking he has a Right to the Tenth Part, which he always appropriates to charitable Ufes. To this Sum he frequently makes other voluntary Additions, infomuch that in a good Year, for fuch he accounts thofe in which he has been able to make greater Bounties than ordinary, he has given above twice that Sum to the Sickly and Indigent. Eugenius prefcribes to himfelf many particular Days of Fafting and Abftinence, in order to encrease his private Bank of Charity, and fets afide what would be the current Expences of thofe Times for the Use of the Poor. He often goes a-foot where his Bufinefs calls him, and at the End of his Walk has given a Shilling, which in his ordinary Methods of Expence would have gone for CoachHire, to the firft Neceffitous Perfon that has fallen in his Way. I have known him, when he has been going to a Play or an Opera, divert the Money which was defigned for that Purpofe, upon an Object of Charity whom he has met with in the Street; and afterwards pafs his Evening in a Coffee-Houfe, or at a Friend's Fire-fide, with much greater Satisfaction to himself than he could have received from the most exquifite Entertainments of the Theatre. By thefe means he is generous without impoverifhing himself, and enjoys his Eftate by making it the Property of others.

No 199. THERE are few Men fo cramped in their private 'Affairs, who may not be charitable after this manner, without any Difadvantage to themselves, or Prejudice to their Families. It is but fometimes facrificing a Diverfion or Convenience to the Poor, and turning the ufual Courfe of our Expences into a better Channel. This is, I think, not only the most prudent and convenient, but the most meritorious Piece of Charity, which we can put in Practice. By this Method we in fome measure share the Neceffities of the Poor at the fame Time that we relieve them, and make our felves not only their Patrons, but their Fellow-Sufferers.

SIR Thomas Brown, in the last Part of his Religio Medici, in which he defcribes his Charity in feveral Heroick Inftances, and with a noble Heat of Sentiments, mentions that Verfe in the Proverbs of Solomon, He that giveth to the Poor lendeth to the Lord: There is more Rhetorick in that one Sentence, fays he, than in a Library of Sermons; and indeed if thofe Sentences were understood by the Reader, with the fame Emphafis as they are delivered by the Author, we needed not thofe Volumes of Inftructions, but might be honeft by an Epitome.

THIS Paffage in Scripture is indeed wonderfully perfwafive; but I think the fame Thought is carried much further in the New Teftament, where our Saviour tells us in a most pathetick manner, that he fhall hereafter regard the Cloathing of the Naked, the Feeding of the Hungry, and the Vifiting of the Imprifoned, as Offices done to himself, and reward them accordingly. Purfuant to those Paffages in Holy Scripture, I have fomewhere met with the Epitaph of a charitable Man, which has very much pleafed me. I cannot recollect the Words, but the Senfe of it is to this Purpofe: What I spent I loft; what I poffeffed is left to others; what I gave away remains with me.

SINCE I am thus infenfibly engaged in Sacred Writ, I cannot forbear making an Extract of feveral Paffages which I have always read with great Delight in the Book of Job. It is the Account which that Holy Man gives of

his