his coming to Jerusalem, in the twenty-first of the Acts. He then, upon all occasions, owned himself to be a Pharisee. In the twenty-second chapter he told the people, that he had been bred up at the feet of Gamaliel after the strictest manner, in the law of his fathers. In the twen ty-third chapter he told the council that he was a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee, and that he was accused for asserting the hope and resur until his journey to Rome, we find not only no | Sadducees pursuing St. Paul even to death at opposition to Christianity from the Pharisces, but several signal occasions in which they as sisted its first teachers, when the Christian church was in its infant state. The true, zealous, and hearty persecutors of Christianity at that time were the Sadducees, whom we may truly call the free-thinkers ainong the Jews. They believed neither resurrection, nor angel, nor spirit, i. e. in plain English, they were deists at least, if not atheists. They could out-rection of the dead, which was their darling wardly comply with, and conform to the establishment in church and state, and they pretended, forsooth, to belong only to a particular sect; and because there was nothing in the law of Moses which in so many words asserted a resurrection, they appeared to adhere to that in a particular manner beyond any other part of the Old Testament. These men, therefore, justly dreaded the spreading of Christianity after the ascension of our Lord, because it was wholly founded upon his resurrection. doctrine. Hereupon the Pharisees stood by him, and though they did not own our Saviour to be the Messiah, yet they would not deny but some angel or spirit might have spoken to him, and then if they, opposed him, they should fight against God. This was the very argument Gamaliel had used before. The resurrection of our Lord, which they saw so strenuously asserted by the apostles, whose miracles they also saw and owned, (Acts iv. 16,) seems to have struck them, and many of them were converted (Acts xv. 5,) even without a miracle, and the rest stood still and made no opposition. 'We see here what the part was, which the Pharisces acted in this important conjuncture. Of the Sadducees, we meet not with one in the whole apostolic history that was converted. We hear of no miracles wrought to convince any of them, though there was an eminent one wrought to reclaim a Pharisee. St. Paul we see, after his conversion, always gloried in his having been bred a Pharisee. He did so to the people of Jerusalem, to the great council, to king Agrippa, and to the Philippians. So that from hence we may justly infer, that it was not their institution, which was in itself laudable, which our blessed Saviour found fault with, but it was their hypocrisy, their covetousness, their oppression, their overvaluing themselves upon their zeal for the ceremonial law, and their adding to that yoke by their traditions, all which were not properly essentials of their institution, that our Lord blamed. Accordingly, therefore, when Peter and John had cured the lame man at the beautiful gate of the temple, and had thereby raised a wonderful expectation of themselves among the people, the priests and Sadducees, (Acts iv,) clapt them up, and sent them away for the first time with a severe reprimand. Quickly after, when the deaths of Ananias and Sapphira, and the many miracles wrought after those severe instances of the apostolical power had alarmed the priests, who looked upon the temple-worship, and consequently their bread, to be struck at; these priests, and all they that were with them, who were of the sect of the Sadducees, imprisoned the apostles, intending to examine them in the great council the next day. Where, when the council met, and the priests and Sadducees proposed to proceed with great rigour against them, we find that Gamaliel, a very eminent Pharisee, Saint Paul's master, a man of great authority among the people, many of whose determinations we have still preserved in the body of the Jewish traditions, commonly called the Talmud, op- 'But I must not run on. What I would obposed their heat, and told them, for aught they serve, sir, is that atheism is more dreadful, and knew, the apostles might be actuated by the Spi-would be more grievous to human society, if it rit of God, and that in such a case it would be in were invested with sufficient power, than relivain to oppose them, since, if they did so, they gion under any shape, where its professors do would only fight against God, whom they could at the bottom believe what they profess. I not overcome. Gamaliel was so considerable a despair not of a papist's conversion, though I man among his own sect, that we may reason-would not willingly lie at a zealot papist's merably believe he spoke the sense of his party as well as his own. St. Stephen's martyrdom came on presently after, in which we do not find the Pharisees, as such, had any hand; it is probable that he was prosecuted by those who had before imprisoned Peter and John. One novice indeed of that sect was so zealous, that he kept the clothes of those that stoned him. This novice, whose zeal went beyond all bounds, was the great St. Paul, who was peculiarly honoured with a call froin heaven, by which he was converted, and he was afterwards, by God himself, appointed to be the apostle of the Gentiles. Be. sides him, and him too reclaimed in so glorious a manner, we find no one Pharisee, either named or hinted at by St. Luke, as an opposer of Christianity in those earliest days. What others might do we know not. But we find the cy, (and no protestant would, if he knew what popery is) though he truly believes in our Saviour. But the free-thinker, who scarcely believes there is a God, and certainly disbelieves revelation, is a very terrible animal. He will talk of natural rights, and the just freedoms of mankind, no longer than until he himself gets into power; and by the instance before us, we have small grounds to hope for his salvation, or that God will ever vouchsafe him sufficient grace to reclaim him from errors, which have been so immediately levelled against himself. 'If these notions be true, as I verily believe they are, I thought they might be worth publishing at this time, for which reason they are sent in this manner to you by, sir, your most humble servant, 'M. N.' ercises as many of them are incapable of performing with any tolerable success. Upon this emergency they are succoured by the allowed wits of their respective colleges, who are always ready to befriend them with two or three hundred Latin or Greek words thrown together with a very small proportion of sense. But the most established error of our university education, is the general neglect of all the little qualifications and accomplishments which make up the character of a well-bred man, and the general attention to what is called deep learning. But as there are very few blessed with a genius that shall force success by the strength of itself alone, and few occasions of life that require the aid of such genius; the vast majority of the unblessed souls ought to store themselves with such acquisitions, in which every man has capacity to make a considerable progress, and from which every common occasion of life may reap great advantage. The persons that may be useful to us in the making our fortunes, are such as are already happy in their own; I may proceed to say, that the men of figure and family are more superficial in their education, than those of a less degree, and of course, are ready to encourage and protect that qualification in another, which they themselves are masters of. For their own application implies the pursuit of something commendable; and when they see their own characters proposed as imitable, they must be won by such an irresistible flattery. But those of the university, who are to make their for. tunes by a ready insinuation into the favour of their superiors, contemn this necessary foppery so far, as not to be able to speak common sense to them without hesitation, perplexity, and confusion. For want of care in acquiring less accomplishments which adorn ordinary life, he that is so unhappy as to be born poor, is condemned to a method that will very probably SINCE our success in worldly matters may be said to depend upon our education, it will be very much to the purpose to inquire if the foundations of our fortune could not be laid deeper and surer than they are. The education of youth falls of necessity under the direction of those who, through fondness to us and our abilities, as well as to their own unwarrantable conjectures, are very likely to be deceived; and the misery of it is, that the poor creatures, who are the sufferers upon wrong advances, seldom find out the errors, until they become irretrievable. As the greater number of all degrees and conditions have their education at the universities, the errors which I conceive to be in those places, fall most naturally under the following observation. The first mismanagement in these public nurseries, is the calling together a number of pupils, of howsoever different ages, views, and capacities, to the same lectures: but surely there can be no reason to think, that a delicate tender babe, just weaned from the bosom of his mother, indulged in all the impertinencies of his heart's desire, should be equally capable of receiving a lecture of philosophy, with a hardy ruffian of full age, who has been occasionally Scourged through some of the great schools, groaned under constant rebuke and chastisement, and maintained a ten years' war with literature, under very strict and rugged disci-keep him so. pline. I know the reader has pleased himself with an answer to this already, viz. That an attention to the particular abilities and designs of the pupil cannot be expected from the trifling salary paid upon such account. The price, indeed, which is thought a sufficient reward for any advantages a youth can receive from a man of learning, is an abominable consideration; the enlarging which would not only increase the care of tutors, but would be a very great encouragement to such as designed to take this province upon them, to furnish themselves with a more general and extensive knowledge. As the case now stands, those of the first quality pay their tutors but little above half so much as they do their footmen: what morality, what history, what taste of the modern languages, what lastly, that can make a man happy or great, may not be expected in return for such an immense treasure! It is monstrous, indeed, that the men of the best estates and families, are more solicitous about the tutelage of a favourite dog or horse, than of their heirs male. The next evil is the pedantical veneration that is maintained at the university for the Greek and Latin, which puts the youth upon such ex I hope all the learned will forgive me what is said purely for their service, and tends to no other injury against them, than admonishing them not to overlook such little qualifications as they every day see defeat, their greater excellencies in the pursuit both of reputation and fortune. If the youth of the university were to be advanced according to their sufficiency in the severe progress of learning: or, riches could be secured to men of understanding, and favour to men of skill; then indeed all studies were solemnly to be defied, that did not seriously pursue the main end; but since our merit is to be tried by the unskilful many, we must gratify the sense of the injudicious majority, satisfying ourselves that the shame of a trivial qualification sticks only upon him that prefers it to one more substantial. The more accomplishments a man is master of, the better is he prepared for a more extended acquaintance, and upon these considerations, without doubt, the author of the Italian book called Il Cortegiano, or, The Courtier, makes throwing the bar, vaulting the horse, nay even wrestling, with several other as low qualifications, necessary for the man whom he figures for a perfect courtier; for this reason no doubt, because his end being to find grace in the eyes of men of all degrees, the means to pursue this end, was the furnishing him with such real and seeming excellencies as each degree had its particular taste of But those of the university, instead of employing their leisure hours in the pursuit of such acquisitions as would shorten their way to better fortune, enjoy those moments at certain houses in the town, or repair to others at very pretty distances out of it, where they drink and forget their poverty, and remember their misery no more.' Persons of this indigent education are apt to pass upon themselves and others for modest, especially in the point of behaviour; though it is easy to prove, that this mistaken modesty not only arises from ignorance, but begets the appearance of its opposite pride. For he that is conscious of his own insufficiency to address his superiors without appearing ridiculous, is by that betrayed into the same neglect and indifference towards them which may bear the construction of pride. From this habit they begin to argue against the base submissive application from men of letters to men of fortune, and be grieved when they see, as Ben Jonson says, -The learned pate Duck to the golden fool." though these are points of necessity and convenience, and to be esteemed submissions rather to the occasion than to the person. It was a fine answer of Diogenes, who being asked in mockery, why philosophers were the followers of rich men, and not rich men of philosophers, replied, Because the one knew what they had need of, and the other did not.' It certainly must be difficult to prove, that a man of business, or a profession, ought not to be what we call a gentleman, but yet very few of them are so. Upon this account they have little conversation with those who might do them most service, but upon such occasions only as application is made to them in their particular calling ; | and for any thing they can do or say in such matters have their reward, and therefore rather receive than confer an obligation; whereas he that adds his being agreeable to his being serviceable, is constantly in a capacity of obliging others. The character of a beau, is, think, what the men that pretend to learning please themselves in ridiculing and yet if we compare these persons as we see them in public, we shall find that the lettered coxcombs without good-breeding, give more just occasion to raillery, than the unlettered coxcombs with it; as our behaviour falls within the judgment of more persons than our conversation, and a failure in it is therefore more visible. What pleasant victories over the loud, the saucy, and the illiterate, would attend the men of learning and breeding which qualifications could we but join, would beget such a confidence as, arising from good sense and good nature, would never let us oppress others or desert ourselves. In short, whether a man intends a life of busi. ness or pleasure, it is impossible to pursue either in an elegant manner, without the help of good-breeding. I shall conclude with the face at least of a regular discourse; and say, if 'SIR,-This day Mr. Oliver Purville, gentleman, property-man to the theatre royal, in the room of Mr. William Peer, deceased, arrived here in widow Bartlett's wagon. He is a humble member of the Little Club, and a passionate man, which makes him tell the disasters which he met with on his road hither, a little too incoherently to be rightly understood. By what I can gather from him, it seems that within three miles of this side Wickham, the party was set upon by highwaymen. Mr. Purville was supercargo to the great hamper, in which were the following goods. The chains of Jaffier and Pierre; the crowns and sceptres of the posterity of Banquo; the bull, bear, and horse of captain Otter; bones, skulls, pickaxes, and a bottle of brandy, and five muskets; four-score pieces of stock-gold and thirty pieces of tin-silver, hid in a green purse within a skull. These the rob bers, by being put up safe, supposed to be true, and rid off with, not forgetting to take Mr. Purville's own current coin. They broke the armour of Jacomo, which was cased up in the same hamper, and one of them put on the said Jacomo's mask to escape. They also did several extravagancies with no other purpose but to do mischief; they broke a mace for the lord mayor of London. They also destroyed the world, the sun, and moon, which lay loose in the wagon. Mrs. Bartlett is frightened out of her wits, for Purville says he has her servant's receipt for the world, and expects she shall make it good. Purville is resolved to take no lodgings in town, but makes, behind the scenes, a bedchamber of the hamper. His bed is that in which Desdemona is to die, and he uses the sheet (in which Mr. Johnson is tied up in a comedy,) for his own bed of nights. It is to be hoped the great ones will consider Mr. Purville's loss. One of the robbers has sent, by a country fellow, the stock-gold, and had the im pudence to write the following letter to Mr. Purville. "SIR,-If you had been an honest man, you would not have put bad money upon men who venture their lives for it. But we shall see you when you come back. "PHILIP SCOWRER." 'There are many things in this matter which employ the ablest men here, as whether an ac. tion will lie for the world among people who 'HONOURED SIR,-Your character of Guardian makes it not only necessary, but becoming, to have several employed under you. And being myself ambitious of your service, I am now your humble petitioner to be admitted into a place I do not find yet disposed of-I mean that of your lion-catcher. It was, sir, for want of such commission from your honour, very many lions have lately escaped. However, I made bold to distinguish a couple. One I found in a coffee-house-He was of the larger sort, looked fierce, and roared loud. I considered wherein he was dangerous; and accordingly expressed my displeasure against him, in such a manner upon his chaps, that now he is not able to show his teeth. The other was a small lion, who was slipping by me as I stood at the corner of an alley-I smelt the creature presently, and catched at him, but he got off with the loss of a lock of hair only, which proved of a dark colour. This and the teeth above-mentioned I have by me, and design them both for a present to Button's coffee-house. Besides this way of dealing with them, I have invented many curious traps, snares, and artificial baits, which, it is humbly conceived, cannot fail of clearing the kingdom of the whole species in a short time. This is humbly submitted to your honour's consideration; and I am ready to appear before your honour, to answer to such questions as you in your great wisdom, shall think meet to ask, whenever you please to command your honour's most obedient humble servant, HERCULES CRABTREE. 'N. B. I have an excellent nose." would be a sufficient guard to us from all such 'P. S. The room above stairs is the handlarge pier glasses for persons to view themselves somest in this part of the town, furnished with in, who have no business with any body else, and every way fit for the reception of fine gentlemen.' SIR,-I am a very great scholar, wear a fair wig, and have an immense number of books curiously bound and gilt. I excel in a singularity of diction and manners, and visit persons of the first quality. In fine, I have by me a great quantity of cockle-shells, which, however, does not defend me from the insults of another learned man, who neglects me in a most insupportable manner: for I have it from persons of undoubted veracity, that he presumed once to pass by my door, without waiting upon me. Whether this be consistent with the respect which we learned men ought to have for each other, I leave to your judgment, and am, sir, your affec tionate friend, PHILAUTUS. 'Oxford, June 18, 1713. 'FRIEND NESTOR,-I had always a great value for thee, and have so still: but I must tell thee, that thou strangely affectest to be sage and solid: now pr'ythee let me observe to thee, that though it be common enough for people as they grow older to grow graver, yet it is not so common to become wiser. Verily to me thou seemest to keep strange company, and with a positive sufficiency, incident to old age, to follow too much thine own inventions. Thou de. pendest too much, likewise, upon thy correspondence here, and art apt to take people's words without consideration. But my present business with thee is to expostulate with thee about a late paper, occasioned, as thou say'st, by Jack Lizard's information, (my very good friend,) that we are to have a public act. 'Now, I say, in that paper, there is nothing contended for which any man of common sense will deny; all that is there said, is, that no man or woman's reputation ought to be blasted, i. e. nobody ought to have an ill character who does not deserve it. Very true; but here's this false consequence insinuated, that therefore nobody ought to hear of their faults; or, in other words, let any body do as much ill as he pleases, he ought not to be told of it. Art thou a patriot, Mr. Ironside, and wilt thou affirm, that arbitrary proceedings and oppression ought to be concealed or justified? Art thou a gentleman, and would'st thou have base, sordid, ignoble tricks connived at or tolerated? Art thou a scho Tom's Coffee-house, in Cornhill, June 19, 1713. SIR,-Reading in your yesterday's paper a letter from Daniel Button, in recommendation of his coffee-house for polite conversation and freedom from the argument by the button, I make bold to send you this to assure you, that at this place there is as yet kept up as good a decorum in the debates of politics, trade, stocks, &c. as at Will's, or at any other coffee-house at your end of the town. In order, therefore, to preserve this house from the arbitrary way of forcing an assent, by seizing on the collar, neck-lar, and would'st thou have learning and good cloth, or any other part of the body or dress, it would be of signal service if you would be pleased to intimate, that we, who frequent this place after Exchange-time, shall have the hoQour of seeing you here sometimes; for that ន manners discouraged? Would'st thou have cringing servility, parasitical shuffling, fawn. ing, and dishonest compliances, made the road to success? Art thou a Christian, and, would'st thou have all villanies within the law practised 12* with impunity? Should they not be told of it? | covered a citizen in battle. A soldier would not only venture his life for a mural crown, but think the most hazardous enterprise sufficiently repaid by so noble a donation. But among all honorary rewards which are neither dangerous nor detrimental to the donor, I remember none so remarkable as the titles which are bestowed by the emperor of China. These are never given to any subject, says monsieur le Comte, until the subject is dead. If he has pleased his emperor to the last, he is called in all public memorials by the title which the emperor confers on him after his death, and his children take their ranks accordingly. This keeps the ambitious subject in a perpetual de'Adieu, old fellow, and let me give thee this pendence, making him always vigilant and advice at parting; E'en get thyself case-har-active, and in every thing conformable to the dened; for though the very best steel may snap, yet old iron, you know, will rust. UMBRA. 'Be just, and publish this.' 'Oxford, Sat. 27, 1713. will of his sovereign. There are no honorary rewards among us, which are more esteemed by the person who receives them, and are cheaper to the prince, than the giving of medals. But there is something in the modern manner of celebrating a great action in medals, which makes such a reward much less valuable than it was among the Romans. There is generally but one coin stamped on the occasion, which is made a present to the person who is celebrated on it. By this means his whole fame is in his own custody. The applause that is bestowed upon him is too much limited and confined. He is in possession of an 'MR. IRONSIDE,―This day arrived the vanguard of the theatrical army. Your friend Mr. George Powel, commanded the artillery, both celestial and terrestrial. The magazines of snow, lightning, and thunder, are safely laid up. We have had no disaster on the way, but that of breaking Cupid's bow by a jolt of the wagon: but they tell us they make them very well in Oxford. We all went in a body, and were shown your chambers in Lincoln college. The Terra-honour which the world perhaps knows nothing filius expects you down, and we of the theatre, design to bring you into town with all our guards. Those of Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, and the faithful retinue of Cato, shall meet you at Shotover. The ghost of Hamlet, and the statue which supped with Don John, both say, that though it be at noon-day, they will attend your entry. Every body expects you with great impatience. We shall be in very good order when all are come down. We have sent to town for a brick-wall which we forgot. The sea is to come by water. Your most ble servant, and faithful correspondent, of. He may be a great man in his own family; his wife and children may see the monument of an exploit, which the public in a little time is a stranger to. The Romans took a quite different method in this particular. Their medals were their current money. When an action deserved to be recorded in coin, it was stamped perhaps upon a hundred thousand pieces of money like our shillings, or halipence, which were issued out of the mint, and became current. This method published every noble action to advan hum-tage, and in a short space of time, spread through the whole Roman empire. The Romans were so careful to preserve the memory of great events upon their coins, that when any particular piece of money grew very scarce, it was often recoined by a succeeding emperor, many years after the death of the emperor to whose honour it was first struck. THE PROMPTER.' Wednesday, July 1, 1713. Cuncti adscint, meritæque expectent præmia palmæ. A friend of mine drew up a project of this kind during the late ministry, which would then have been put in execution had it not been too busy a time for thoughts of that nature. As THERE is no maxim in politics more indis. this project has been very much talked of by putable, than that a nation should have many the gentleman above-mentioned to men of the honours in reserve for those who do national greatest genius, as well as quality; I am inservices. This raises emulation, cherishes pub-formed there is now a design on foot for exe lic merit, and inspires every one with an ambition which promotes the good of his country. The less expensive these honours are to the public, the more still do they turn to its advan-glorious particulars of her majesty's reign. This tage. is one of those arts of peace which may very well deserve to be cultivated, and which may be of great use to posterity. cuting the proposal which was then made, and that we shall have several farthings and halfpence charged on the reverse with many of the The Romans abounded with these little honorary rewards, that without conferring wealth or riches, gave only place and distinction to the As I have in my possession the copy of the person who received them. An oaken garland paper above-mentioned, which was delivered to to be worn on festivals and public ceremonies, the late lord treasurer, I shall here give the pub was the glorious recompence of one who had i lic a sight of it; for I do not question but that |