therefore bear hard upon the fufpected party, pursue her close through all her turnings and windings, and are too well acquainted with the chace, to be flung off by any falle fteps or doubles : befides their acquaintance and converfation has lain wholly among the vicious part of womankind, and therefore it is no wonder they cenfure all alike, and look upon the whole fex as a fpecies of impofters. But if, notwithstanding their private experience, they can get over these prejudices, and entertain a favourable opinion of fome women; yet their own loofe defires will-ftir up new fufpicions from another fide, and inake them believe all men fubject to the fame inclinations with themselves.. WHETHER thefe or other motives are most predomi nant, we learn from the modern hiftories of America, as well as from our own experience in this part of the world, that jealoufy is no northen paffion, but rages most in those nations that lie neareft the influence of the fun. It is a mif fortune for a woman to be born between the tropics; for there lie the hottest regions of jealoufy, which as you come northward cools all along with the climate, till you fcarce meet with any thing like it in the polar circle. Our own nation is very temperately fituated in this refpect; and if we meet with fome few difordered with the violence of this paffion, they are not the proper growth of our country, but are many degrees nearer the fun in their conftitutions than in their climate. AFTER this frightful account of jealoufy, and the perfons who are moft fubject to it, it will be but fair to fhew by what means the paffion may be beft allayed, and those who are poffeffed with it fet at eafe. Other faults indeed are not under the wife's jurifdiction, and fhould, if poffible, efcape her obfervation; but jealoufy calls upon her particularly for its cure, and deferves all her art and aplication in the attempt: befides, fhe has this for her encouragement, that her endeavours will be always pleafing, and that she will ftill find the affection of her husband rifing towards her in proportion as his doubts and fufpicions vanish; for, as we have feen all along, there is fo great a mixture of love in jealoufy, as is well worth the feparating. But this fhall be the fubject of another paper. No. 171 N° 171. Saturday, September 15. Credula res amor eft OVID. Met. 1. 7. v. 826. The man, who loves, is eafy of belief. HA AVING in my yesterday's paper, difcovered the nature of jealoufy, and pointed out the perfons who are most subject to it, I muft here apply myself to my fair correfpondents, who defire to live well with a jealous husband, and to ease his mind of its unjuft fufpicions, THE first rule I fhall propofe to be obferved, is, that you never seem to dislike in another what the jealous man is himself guilty of, or to admire any thing, in which he himself does not excel. A jealous man is very quick in his applications, he knows how to find a double edge in an invective, and to draw a fatire on himself out of a pane gyric.on another. He does not trouble himself to confi. der the perfon, but to direct the character; and is fecretly pleafed or confounded as he finds more or less of himself in it. The commendation of any thing in another ftirs up bis jealoufy, as it fhews you have a value for others befides himself; but the commendation of that, which he himself wants, infames him more, as it fhews, that, in fome re fpects, you prefer others before him. Jealoufy is admirably defcribed in this view by Horace in his ode to Lydia. Quum tu, Lydia, Telephi Cervicem rofeam, & cerea Telephi Laudas brachia, vue meum Fervens difficili bili tumet jecur : Tunc nec mens mihi, nec color Certa fede manet; humor & in genas Furtim labitur, arguens Quam lentis penitus macerer ignibus. Od. 13. 1. 1. When Telephus his youthful charms, My My heart inflam'd with jealous heats, By THE jealous man is not indeed angry if you diflike another: but if you find those faults which are to be found in his own character, you difcover not only your dislike of another, but of himself. In fhort, he is fo defirous of engroffing all your love, that he is grieved at the want of any charm, which he believes has power to raise it ; and if he finds by your cenfures on others, that he is not fo agreeable in your opinion as he might be, he naturally concludes you could love him better if he had other qualifications, and that by confequence your affection does not rife fo high as he thinks it ought. If therefore his temper be grave or fullen, you must not be too much pleafed with a jeft, or tranfported with any think that is gay and diverting. If his beauty be none of the best, you must be a profeffed admirer of prudence, or any other quality he is mafter of, or at least vain enough to think he is. In the next place, you must be fure to be free and open in your conversation with him, and to let in light upon your actions, to unravel all your defigns, and difcover every fecret however trifling or indifferent A jealous hus band has a particular aversion to winks and whispers, and if he does not fee to the bottom of every thing, will be fure to go beyond it in his fears and fufpicions. He will always expect to be your chief confident, and where he finds himself kept out of a fecret, will believe there is more in it than there fhould be. And here it is of great concern, that you preserve the character of your fincerity uniform and of a piece: for if he once finds a falfe glofs put upon any fingle action, he quickly fufpects all the reft; his working imagination immediately takes a falfe hint, and runs off with it into feveral remote confequences, till he he has proved very ingenious in working out his own mifery. IF both these methods fail, the best way will be to let him see you are much cast down and afflicted for the ill opinion he entertains of you, and the difquietudes he himfelf fuffers for your fake. There are many who take a kind of barbarous pleasure in the jealousy of those who love them, that infult over an aking heart, and triumph in their charms which are able to excite fo much uneafinefs. Ardeat ipfa licet, tormentis gaudet amantis. Juv. Sat. 6. v. I. 208. But thefe often carry the humour fo far, till their affected coldness and indifference quite kills all the fondness of a lover, and are then fure to meet in their turn with all the contempt and fcorn that is due to fo infolent a behaviour. On the contrary, it is very probable a melancholy, dejected carriage, the ufual effects of injured innocence, may foften the jealous husband into pity, make him fenfible of the wrong he does you, and work out of his mind all thofe fears and fufpicions that make you both unhappy At least it will have this good effect, that he will keep his jealoufy to himself, and repine in private, either because he is fenfible it is a weakness, and will therefore hide it from your knowledge, or because he will be apt to fear fome ill effect it may produce, in cooling your love towards him, or diverting it to another. THERE is ftill another fecret that can never fail, if you can once get it believed, and which is often practifed by women of greater cunning than virtue: this is to change fides for a while with the jealous man, and to turn his own paffion upon himself; to take fome occafion of growing jealous of him, and to follow the example he himself hath fet you. This counterfeited jealoufy will bring him a great deal of pleasure, if he thinks it real; for he knows experimentally how much love goes along with his paffion, and will befides feel fomething like the fatisfaction of a revenge, in feeing you undergo all his own tortures.' But this, indeed, is an artifice fo difficult, and at the fame time fo difingenuous, that it ought never to be put in prac tice, but by fuch as have skill enough to cover the deceit, and innocence to render it excufeable. I SHALL Conclude this effay with the ftory of Herod and Mariamne, as I have collected it from Jofephus ; which may ferve almoft as an example to whatever can be faid on this fubject. MARIAMNE had all the charms that beauty, birth, wit, and youth could give a woman, and Herod all the love that fuch charms are able to raife in a warm and amorous difpofition. In the midst of this his fondness for Mas riamne, he put her brother to death, as he did her father not inany years after. The barbarity of the action was reprefented to Mark Antony, who immediately fummoned Herod into Egypt, to answer for the crime that was there laid to his charge. Herod attributed the fummons to Artony's defire of Mariamne, whom therefore, before his departure, he gave unto the cuftody of his uncle Jofeph, with private orders to put her to death, if any fuch violence was offered to himfelf. This Jofeph was much delighted with Mariamne's converfation, and endeavoured with all his art and rhetoric, to fet out the excels of Herod's paffion for her; but when he ftill found her cold and incredulous, he inconfiderately told her, as a certain inftance of her lord's affection, the private orders he had left behind him, which plainly fhewed, according to Jofeph's interpretation, that he could neither live nor die without her. This barbarous inftance of a wild unreafonable paffion quite put out, for a time, thofe little remains of affection fhe ftill had for her lord: her thoughts were fo wholly taken up with the cruelty of his orders, that fhe could not confider the kindness that produced them, and therefore represented him in her imagination rather under the frightful idea of a murderer than a lover. Herod was at length acquitted and difmiffed by Mark Antony, when his foul was all in flames for his Mariamue; but before their meeting, he was not a little alarmed at the report he had heard of his uncle's converfation and familiarity with her in his abfence. This therefore was the first difcourfe he entertained her with, in which fhe found it no eafy matter to quiet his fufpicions. But at laft he appeared fo well fatisfied of her innocence, that from reproaches and wranglings he fell to tears and embraces. Both of them wept very tenderly at their recon VOL. III. B ciliation, |