that elegance and politeness which appear in your more retired converfation. I fhould be unpardonable, if, after what I have faid, I fhould longer detain you with an addrefs of this nature: I cannot, however, conclude it without owning thofe great obligations which you have laid upon, SIR, Your most obedient, humble Servant, The SPECTATOR. In amore hæc omnia infunt vitia: injuriæ, Bellum, pax rurfum TER. Eun. A&t. i. Sc. 1.. All thefe inconveniencies are incident to love : Reproaches, jealoufies, quarrels, reconcilements, war, and then peace. U PON looking over the letters of my female correfpondents, I find feveral from women complaining of jealous husbands; and at the fame time protefting their own innocence; and defiring my advice on this occafion. Ffhall therefore take this fubject into my confideration, and the more willingly, because I find that the Marquis of Hallifax, who, in his Advice to a Daughter, has inftructed a wife how to behave herfelf towards a falfe, an intemperate, a cholerick, a fullen, a covetous, or a filly husband, has not spoken one word of a jealous hufband. Jealousy is that pain which a man feels from the apprehenfion that he is not equally beloved by the perfon whom he intirely loves. Now because our inward VOL. III. A 2 paffions paffions and inclinations can never make themfelves visible, it is impoffible for a jealous man to be thoroughly cured of his fufpicions. His thoughts bang at beft in a state of doubtfulness and uncertainty; and are never capable of receiving any fatisfaction on the advantageous fide; fo that his inquiries are moft fuccefsful when they discover nothing. His pleafure arifes from his difappointments, and his life is fpent in purfuit of a fecret that deftroys his happinefs if he chance to find it. An ardent love is always a ftrong ingredient in this paffion; for the fame affection which ftirs up the jealous man's defires, and gives the party beloved fo beautiful a figure in his imagination, makes him believe the kindles the fame paffion in others, and appears as amiable to all beholders. And as jealoufy thus arifes from an extraordinary love, it is of fo delicate a nature, that it fcorns to take up with any thing lefs than an equal return of love. Not the warmest expreffions of affection, the softest and most tender hypocrify, are able to give any fatisfaction, where we are not perfuaded that the affection is real and the fatisfaction mutual. For the jealous man wishes himself a kind of deity to the perfon he loves: He would be the only pleasure of her fenfes, the employment of her thoughts; and is angry at every thing the admires, or takes delight in, befides himself. Phadria's request to his mistress, upon his leav ing her for three days, is inimitably beautiful and natural. Cum milite ifto præfens, abfens ut fies: TER. Eun Act. i. Sc. 2. "When you are in company with that foldier, be "have as if you were abfent: But continue to "love me by day and by night: Want me; dream "of me; expect me; think of me; with for me; "delight in me: Be wholly with me: In fhort, be my very foul, as I am yours." The jealous man's disease is of fo malignant a nature, that it converts all it takes into its own nourishment. A cool behaviour fets him on the rack, and is interpreted as an inftance of averfion or indifference; a fond one raifes his fufpicions, and looks too much like diffimulation and artifice. If the perfon he loves be cheerful, her thoughts must be employed on another; and if fad, fhe is certainly thinking on himself. In fhort, there is no word or gefture fo infignificant, but it gives him new hints, feeds his fufpicions, and furnishes him with fresh matters of difcovery: So that if we confider the effects of this paffion, one would rather think it proceeded from an inveterate hatred, than an exceffive love; for certainly none can meet with more difquietude and uneafinefs than a fufpected wife, if we except the jealous husband.. But the great unhappiness of this paffion is, that it naturally tends to alienate the affection which it is fo folicitous to ingrofs; and that for these two reafons, because it lays too great a constraint on the words and actions of the fufpected perfon, and at the fame time fhews you have no honourable opinion of her; both of which are ftrong motives to averfion... Nor is this the worft effect of jealoufy; for it often draws after it a more fatal train of confequences, and makes the perfon you fufpect guilty of the very crimes you are fo much afraid of. It is very natural for fuch who are treated ill and up. braided falfely, to find out an intimate friend that will hear their complaints, condole their fufferings, and endeavour to footh and affuage their fecret refentments. A 3 fentments. Befides, jealoufy puts a woman often in mind of an ill thing that the would not otherwise perhaps have thought of, and fills her imagination with fuch an unlucky idea, as in time grows familiar, excites defire, and lofes all the fhame and horror which might at first attend it. Nor is it a wonder if fhe who fuffers wrongfully in a man's opinion of her, and has therefore nothing to forfeit in his esteem, refolves to give him reafon for his. fufpicions, and to enjoy the pleasure of the crime, fince the muft undergo the ignominy. Such probably were the confiderations that directed the wife man in his advice to husbands; Be not jealous over the wife of thy bofom, and teach her not an evil leffon: against thyself. Ecclus. And here, among the other torments which this. paffion produces, we may ufually obferve that none are greater mourners than jealous men, when the perfon who provoked their jealoufy is taken from them. Then it is that their love breaks out furioufly, and throws off all the mixtures of fufpicion which chocked and smothered it before. The beautiful parts of the character rife uppermoft in the jealous husband's memory, and upbraid him with the ill-ufage of fo divine a creature as was once in: his poffeffion; whilst all the little imperfections, that were before fo uneafy to him, wear off from his re-membrance, and fhew themselves no more. We may fee by what has been faid, that jealoufy takes the deepeft root in men of amorous difpofiand of those we may find three kinds who are moft over-run with it. tions; The first are those who are conscious to themfelves of an infirmity, whether it be weakness, old age, deformity, ignorance, or the like.. Thefe men. are fo well acquainted with the unamiable part of themselves, that they have not the confidence to think they are really beloved; and are fo diftruftful of their own merits, that all fondness towards them |