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but evil tempers are long before they are exalted into good habits. To help this by punishments, is the same thing as killing a man to cure him of a distemper; when he comes to suffer punishment in that one circumstance, he is brought below the existence of a rational creature, and is in the state of a brute that moves only by the admonition of stripes. But since this custom of educating by the lash is suffered by the gentry of Great Britain, I would prevail only that honest heavy lads may be dismissed from slavery sooner than they are at present, and o not whipped on to their fourteenth or fifteenth year, whether they expect any progress from them or not. Let the child's capacity be forthwith examined, and he sent to some mechanic way of life, without respect to his birth, if nature designed him for nothing higher: let him go before he has innocently suffered, and is debased into a dereliction of mind for being what it is no guilt to be, a plain man. I would not here be supposed to have said, that our learned men of either robe who have been whipped at school, are not still men of noble and liberal minds; but I am sure they would have been much more so than they are, o had they never suffered that infamy".

Spectator, No. 157.]

[August 30, 1711.

No. 123. An Editor's Troubles; Anecdote of an old Soldier.

Qui promittit cives, urbem sibi curæ,
Imperium fore et Italiam, delubra Deorum,
Quo patre sit natus, num ignota matre inhonestus,
Omnes mortales curare et quærere cogit.
HOR. Sat. i. 6. 34.

I have lately been looking over the many packets of letters which I have received from all quarters of Great Britain, as well as from foreign countries, since my entering upon the office of Censor; and indeed am very much surprised to see so great a number of them, and pleased to think that I have so far increased the revenue of the post-office. As this collection will grow daily, I have digested it into several bundles, and made proper in

dorsements on each particular letter; it being my design, when I lay down the work that I am now engaged in, to erect a paper-office", and give it to the public.

I could not but make several observations upon reading over the letters of my correspondents. As, first of all, on the different tastes that reign in the different parts of this city. I find by the approbations which are given me, that I am seldom famous on the same days on both sides of Temple-bar; and that when I am in the greatest repute within the liberties ", I dwindle at the 10 court-end of the town. Sometimes I sink in both these places at the same time; but, for my comfort, my name hath then been up in the districts of Wapping and Rotherhithe. Some of my correspondents desire me to be always serious, and others to be always merry. Some of them entreat me to go to bed and fall into a dream, and like me better when I am asleep than when I am awake: others advise me to sit all night upon the stars, and be more frequent in my astrological observations; for that a vision is not properly a lucubration. Some of my readers thank me for filling my paper with the flowers of antiquity, others 20 desire news from Flanders. Some approve my criticisms on the dead, and others my censures on the living. For this reason, I once resolved, in the new edition of my works, to range my several papers under distinct heads, according as their principal design was to benefit and instruct the different capacities of my readers; and to follow the example of some very great authors, by writing at the head of each discourse, Ad Aulàm, Ad Academiam, Ad Populum, Ad Clerum.

There is no particular in which my correspondents of all ages, conditions, sexes, and complexions, universally agree, except 30 only in their thirst after scandal. It is impossible to conceive, how many have recommended their neighbours to me upon this account, or how unmercifully I have been abused by several unknown hands, for not publishing the secret histories. . . that I have received from almost every street in town.

It would indeed be very dangerous for me to read over the many praises and eulogiums, which come post to me from all the corners of the nation, were they not mixed with many checks, reprimands, scurrilities, and reproaches; which several of my good-natured countrymen cannot forbear sending me, 40 though it often costs them twopence or a groat before they can

convey them to my hands: so that sometimes when I am put into the best humour in the world, after having read a panegyric upon my performances, and looked upon myself as a benefactor to the British nation, the next letter, perhaps, I open, begins with, 'You old doting scoundrel!--Are not you a sad dog?

-Sirrah, you deserve to have your nose slit;' and the like ingenious conceits. These little mortifications are necessary to suppress that pride and vanity which naturally arise in the mind of a received author, and enable me to bear the reputation To which my courteous readers bestow upon me, without becoming a coxcomb by it. It was for the same reason, that when a Roman general entered the city in the pomp of a triumph, the commonwealth allowed of several little drawbacks to his reputation, by conniving at such of the rabble as repeated libels and lampoons upon him within his hearing; and by that means engaged his thoughts upon his weakness and imperfections, as well as on the merits that advanced him to so great honours. The conqueror, however, was not the less esteemed for being a man in some particulars, because he appeared as a god in 20 others.

There is another circumstance in which my countrymen have dealt very perversely with me; and that is, in searching not only into my life, but also into the lives of my ancestors. If there has been a blot in my family for these ten generations, it hath been discovered by some or other of my correspondents. In short, I find the ancient family of the Bickerstaffs has suffered very much through the malice aud prejudice of my enemies. Some of them twit me in the teeth with the conduct of my aunt Margery". Nay, there are some who have been so 30 disingenuous, as to throw Maud the milkmaid" into my dish, notwithstanding I myself was the first who discovered that alliance. I reap however many benefits from the malice of these enemies, as they let me see my own faults, and give me a view of myself in the worst light; as they hinder me from being blown up by flattery and self-conceit; as they make me keep a watchful eye over my own actions; and at the same time make me cautious how I talk of others, and particularly of my friends and relations, or value myself upon the antiquity of my family.

40

But the most formidable part of my correspondents are those, whose letters are filled with threats and menaces. I have been

treated so often after this manner, that, not thinking it sufficient to fence well, in which I am now arrived at the utmost perfection, and carry pistols about me, which I have always tucked within my girdle; I several months since made my will, settled my estate, and took leave of my friends, looking upon myself as no better than a dead man. Nay, I went so far as to write a long letter to the most intimate acquaintance I have in the world, under the character of a departed person, giving him an account of what brought me to that untimely end, and of the 10 fortitude with which I met it. This letter being too long for the present paper, I intend to print it by itself very suddenly; and, at the same time, I must confess I took my hint of it from the behaviour of an old soldier in the civil wars, who was corporal of a company in a regiment of foot, about the same time that I myself was a cadet " in the king's army.

This gentleman was taken by the enemy; and the two parties were upon such terms at that time, that we did not treat each other as prisoners of war, but as traitors and rebels. The poor corporal, being condemned to die, wrote a letter to his wife 20 when under sentence of execution. He writ on the Thursday, and was to be executed on the Friday : but, considering that the letter would not come to his wife's hands until Saturday, the day after execution, and being at that time more scrupulous than ordinary in speaking exact truth, he formed his letter rather according to the posture of his affairs when she should read it, than as they stood when he sent it: though, it must be confessed, there is a certain perplexity in the style of it, which the reader will easily pardon, considering his circumstances.

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'DEAR WIFE,

'Hoping you are in good health, as I am at this present writing; this is to let you know, that yesterday, between the hours of eleven and twelve, I was hanged, drawn, and quartered. I died very penitently, and every body thought my case very hard. Remember me kindly to my poor fatherless children. 'Yours until death,

'W. B.'

It so happened, that this honest fellow was relieved by a party of his friends, and had the satisfaction to see all the rebels hanged who had been his enemies. I must not omit a circum

stance which exposed him to raillery his whole life after. Before the arrival of the next post, that would have set all things clear, his wife was married to a second husband, who lived in the peaceable possession of her; and the corporal, who was a man of plain understanding, did not care to stir in the matter, as knowing that she had the news of his death under his own hand, which she might have produced upon occasion. Tatler, No. 164.]

[April 27, 1710.

No. 124. On a Poetical Stock in Trade.

Invenias disjecti membra poetæ.-HOR. Sat. i. 4. 62.

I was this evening sitting at the side-table and reading one of my own papers with great satisfaction, not knowing that I Io was observed by any in the room. I had not long enjoyed this secret pleasure of an author, when a gentleman", some of whose works I have been highly entertained with, accosted me after the following manner. 'Mr. Bickerstaff, you know I have for some years devoted myself wholly to the muses, and, perhaps, you will be surprised when I tell you I am resolved to take up, and apply myself to business. I shall therefore beg you will stand my friend, and recommend a customer to me for several goods that I have now upon my hands.'-'I desired him to let me have a particular, and I would do my utmost to serve him.' 20 'I have first of all,' says he, 'the progress of an amour digested into sonnets, beginning with a poem to the unknown fair, and ending with an epithalamium. I have celebrated in it her cruelty, her pity, her face, her shape, her wit, her good humour, her dancing, her singing'-I could not forbear interrupting him; 'This is a most accomplished lady,' said I; 'but has she really, with all these perfections, a fine voice?'-'Pugh,' says he, 'you do not believe there is such a person in nature. This was only my employment in solitude last summer, when I had neither friends nor books to divert me.'-'I was going,' 30 said I, 'to ask her name, but I find it is only an imaginary

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