6. power, every where else; the greatest floven at hoine when he appears to none but his family, and inoft exactly welldreffed in all other places. Alas, Sir, is it of course, that to deliver one's felf wholly into a man's without poffibility of appeal to any other jurifdiction but his own reflections, is fo little an obligation to a gentleman, that he can be offended and fall into a rage, because my heart fwells tears into my eyes when I fee him in a clou "dy nood? I pretend to no fuccour, and hope for no relief but from hinfelf; and yet he that has fenfe and juftice in every thing elfe, never reflects, that to come home only to fleep off an intemperance, and spend all the time he has there as if it were a punishment, cannot but give the anguish of a jealous mind. He always leaves his home as if he were going to court, and returns as if "he were entering a goal. I could add to this, that from his company, and his ufual difcourfe, he does not fcruple being thought an abandoned man as to his morals. Your own imagination will fay enough to you concerning the "condition of m me his wife; and I wish you would be lo good as to represent to him, for he is not ill-natured, and Treads you much, that the moment I hear the door shut after him, I throw myself upon my bed, and drown the child he is fo fond of with my tears, and often frighten "it with my cries; that I curfe my being; that I run to my glafs all over-bathed in forrows, and help the utterance of my inward anguish by beholding the guth of my own calainities as my tears fall from my eyes. looks like an imagined picture to tell you, but indeed this is one of my paftimes. Hitherto I have only told you the general temper of my mind, but how fhall I give you an account of the distraction of it? Could you but conceive how cruel I am one moment in ny refentment, and at the enfuing minute, when I place him in the condition L my anger would bring him to, how compailionate; it would give you fome notion how miferable I am, and how little I deferve it. When I remonftrate with the greatest gentleness that is poffible against unhandfone. appearances, and that married perfons are under particular rules; when he is in the best humour to receive this, I am anfwered only, That I expofe my own repu tation and fenfe if I appear jealous. I with, good Sir, 6 D 2 This you would take this into ferious confideration, and admonish husbands and wives what terms they ought to keep towards each other. Your thoughts on this important fubject will have the greatest reward, that which defcends on fuch as feel the forrows of the afflicted. Give me leave to fubfcribe myself, Your unfortunate bumble fervant, CELINDA. I HAD it in my thoughts, before I received the letter of this lady, to confider this dreadful paffion in the mind of a woman: and the fmart fhe feems to feel does not a-. bate the inclination I had to recommend to husbands a more regular behaviour, than to give the most exquifite of torments to thofe who love thein, nay, whofe torments would be abated if they did not love them. IT is wonderful to obferve how little is made of this inexpreffible injury, and how easily men get into an habit of being leaft agreeable where they are moft obliged to be fo." But this fubject deferves a diftinct fpeculation, and I shall obferve for a day or two the behaviour of two or three happy pair I am acquainted with, before I pretend to make a fyftem of conjugal morality. I defign, in the firft place to go a few miles out of town, and there I know where to meet one who practifes all the parts of a fine gentleman in the duty of an hufband. When he was a batchelor, much bulinefs made him particularly negligent in his habit; but now there is no young lover living fo exact in the care of his perfon. One who asked why he was fo long washing his mouth, and delicate in the choice and wearing of his linen, was anfwered, Because there is a woman of merit obliged to receive me kindly, and I think it incumbent upon me to make her inclination go along with her duty. Ir a man would give himself leave to think, he would not be fo unreafonable as to expect debauchery and innocence could live in commerce together; or hope that flesh and blood is capable of fo ftrict an alliance, as that a fine woman must go on to improve herfelf 'till fhe is as good and impaffive as an angel, only to preferve a fidelity to a brute Brute and a fatyr. The lady who defires me for her fake to end one of my papers with the following letter, I am perfuaded, thinks fuch a perfeverance very impracticable. Hufband, on summikantas vee TAY more at home. I know where you vifited at Seven of the clock on Thursday evening. The colo ←nel, whom you charged me to fee no more, is in town. Martha Housewife. T No 179. Tuesday, September 25. Centuria feniorum agitant expertia frugis: HOR. ars poet. v. 341. Old age explodes all but morality; MAY caft my ALOSCOMMON. Ions, the Mercurial and the tutor Bree readers under two great general divifi-The first are 1 the gay part of my difciples, who require fpeculations of wit and humour; the others are thofe of a more folemn and fober turn, who find no pleasure but in papers of mo rality and found fenfe, The former call every thing that is ferious, ftupid; the latter look upon every thing as imper tinent that is ludicrous. Were I always grave, one half of my readers would fall off from me: were always merry, I fhould lofe the other. I make it therefore my endea vour to find out entertainments of both kinds, and by that means perhaps confult the good of both, more than I should do, did I always write to the particular tafte of either. As they neither of them know what I proceed upon, the fprightly reader, who takes up my paper in order to be di verted, very often finds himself engaged unawares in a fe D 3 rious rious and profitable courfe of thinking; as on the contrary, the thoughtful man, who perhaps may hope to find fomething folid, and full of deep reflection, is very often. infenfibly betrayed into a fit of mirth. In a word, the reader fits down to my entertainment without knowing his bill of fare, and has therefore at least the pleasure of hoping there may be a dish to his palate. I MUST Confels, were I left to myfelt, I fhould rather aim at inftructing than diverting: but if we will be useful to the world, we must take it as we find it. Authors of profeffed feverity difcourage the loofer part of mankind from having any thing to do with their writings. A inan must have virtue in him, before he will enter upon the reading of a Seneca or an Epictetus. The very title of a moral treatife has fomething in it auftere and shocking to the careless and inconfiderate. FOR this reafon feveral unthinking perfons fall in my way, who would give no attention to lectures delivered with a religious ferioufnels or a philofophic gravity. They are infnared into fentiments of wifdom and virtue when they do not think of it; and if by that means they arrive only at fuch a degree of confideratiou as may difpofe them to listen to more ftudied and elaborate difcourfes, I fhall not think my peculations ufelefs. I might likewife obferve, that the gloominefs in which fometimes the minds of the best men are involved, very often ftands in need of Lich little incitements to mirth and laughter, as are apt to difperfe melancholy, and put our faculties in good humour. To which fome will add, that the British climate, more than any other, makes entertainments of this na-, ture in a manner neceffary. Ir what I have here faid does not recommend, it will at leaft excufe the variety of my fpeculations. I would not willingly laugh but in order to inftruct, or if I fometimes fail in this point, when my mirth ceafes to be inftructive, it shall never ceafe to be innocent. A fcrupulous conduct in this particular, has, perhaps more merit in it than the generality of readers imagine: did they know how many thoughts occur in a point of humour, which a difcreet author in modefty fuppreffes; how many strokes of rallery present themfelves, which could not fail to pleafe the ordinary taste of mankind, but are ftiffed in their birth by by reason of fome remote tendency which they carry then to corrupt the minds of those who read them; did they know how many glances of ill-nature are industrious-ly avoided for fear of doing injury to the reputation of another, they would be apt to think kindly of those writers who endeavour to make themfelves diverting without being immoral. One may apply to thefe authors that par fage in Waller,ft han Poets lofe half the praise they would have got, As nothing is more eafy than to be a wit," WHAT I have here faid is not only m regard to the public, but with an eye to my particular correfpondent, who has fent me the following letter, which I have caftrated in fome places upon thefe confiderations. SIR, Hofgrinning, I cannot forbear giving you an acAVING lately feen your difcourfe upon a match count of a whistling match, which, with many others, I was entertained with about th years fince at the Bath. The prize was a guinea, to be conferred upon the ableft whiftler, that is, on him who could whistle cleareft, and go through his tune without laughing, to which at the fame time he was provoked by the antic poftures of a Merry-Andrew, who was to ftand upon the ftage and play his tricks in the eye of the performer. There were three competitors for the ring. The firft was a ploughman of a very promifing afpect; his features were fteady, and his mufcles compofed in fo inflexible a stupidity, that upon his first appearance every one gave th for loft. The pickle-herring however found the way to fake him; for upon his whiffling a country jig, this unlucky wag danced to it with fuch variety of diftortions and grimaces, that the countryman could not forbear fmiling upon him, and by that means fpoiled his whistle, and loft the prize. the THE next that mounted the ftage was an under-citizen of the Bath, a perfon remarkable among the inferior people |