No. 193, they have very good Prospects if they may hope to arrive Thursday, at such Notices half a Year hence,

October 11,

1711.

The Satyrist says there is seldom common Sense in high Fortune; and one would think, to behold a Levée, that the Great were not only infatuated with their Station, but also that they believed all below were seized too, else how is it possible they could think of imposing upon themselves and others in such a degree, as to set up a Levée for any thing but a direct Farce? But such is the Weakness of our Nature, that when Men are a little exalted in their Condition, they immediately conceive they have additional Senses, and their Capacities enlarged not only above other Men, but above human Comprehension it self. Thus it is. ordinary to see a great Man attend one listning, bow to one at a distance, and call to a third at the same instant A Girl in new Ribbands is not more taken with her self, nor does she betray more apparent Coquetries, than even a Wise Man in such a Círcum stance of Courtship, I do not know any thing that I ever thought so very distasteful as the Affectation. which is recorded of Caesar, to wit, that he would dictate to three several Writers at the same time This was an Ambition below the Greatness and Candour of his Mind, He indeed (if any Man had Pretensions to greater Faculties than any other Mortal) was the Person; but such a way of acting is Childish and Inconsistent with the manner of our Being. And it appears from the very Nature of things that there cannot be any thing effectually dispatched in the Distraction of a Publick Levée, but the whole seems to be a Conspiracy of a Sett of Servile Slaves, to give up their own Liberty to take away their Patron's Understanding,

T

No. 194, [STEELE

Friday, October 12.

-Difficili bile tumet jecur-Hor.

The senserre upon Faults that are easily cured
HE present Paper shall consist of two Letters,

both in Love and Friendship. In the latter, as far as
it meerly regards Conversation, the Person who neglects
visiting an agreeable Friend is punished in the very
Transgression; for a good Companion is not found in
every Room we go into. But the Case of Love is of a
more delicate Nature, and the Anxiety is inexpressible
if every little Instance of Kindness is not reciprocal.
There are things in this sort of Commerce which
there are not Words to express, and a Man may not
possibly know how to represent, which yet may tear
his Heart into ten Thousand Tortures. To be grave to
a Man's Mirth, unattentive to his Discourse, or to
interrupt either with something that argues a Disin
clination to be entertained by him, has in it something
so disagreeable, that the utmost Steps which may be
made in further Enmity cannot give greater Torment.
The gay Corinna, who sets up for an Indifference and
becoming Heedlessness, gives her Husband all the
Torment imaginable out of mere Indolence, with this
peculiar Vanity, That she is to look as gay as a
Maid in the Character of a Wife, It is no Matter
what is the Reason of a Man's Grief, if it be heavy
as it is. Her unhappy Man is convinced that she
means him no Dishonour, but pines to Death because
she will not have so much Deference to him as to
avoid the Appearances of it The Author of the
following Letter is perplexed with an Injury that is
in a Degree yet less criminal, and yet the Source of
the utmost Unhappiness.

'Mr. SPECTATOR,

I have read your Papers which relate to Jealousie, and desire your Advice in my Case, which you will say is not common. I have a Wife of whose Virtue am not in the least doubtful; yet I cannot be satisfied

I

No. 194.
Friday,
October
12, 1711.

she

No. 194,
Friday,
October
12, 1711,

she loves me, which gives me as great Uneasiness as being faulty the other way would do. I know not whether I am not yet more miserable than in that Case, for she keeps Possession of my Heart without the Return of her's. I would desire your Observations upon that Temper in some Women, who will not condescend to convince their Husbands of their Innocence or their Love, but are wholly negligent of what Reflections the poor Men make upon their Conduct (so they cannot call it criminal), when at the same time a little Tenderness of Behaviour, or Regard to shew an Inclination to please them, would make them entirely at ease, Do not such Women deserve all the Misinterpretation which they neglect to avoid? or are they not in the actual Practice of Guilt, who care not whether they are thought guilty or not? If my Wife does the most ordinary thing as visiting her Sister, or taking the Air with her Mother, it is always carried with the Air of a Secret: Then she will sometimes tell a thing of no Conse quence, as if it was only want of Memory made her conceal it before; and this only to dally with my Anxiety, I have complained to her of this Behaviour in the gentlest Terms imaginable, and beseeched her not to use him who desired only to live with her like an indulgent Friend, as the most morose and unsociable Husband in the World. It is no easie Matter to describe our Circumstance, but it is miser able with this Aggravation, That it might be easily mended, and yet no Remedy endeavoured, She reads you, and there is a Phrase or two in this Letter which she will know came from me. If we enter into an Explanation which may tend to our future Quiet by your Means, you shall have our joint Thanks: In the mean time I am (as much as I can in this ambiguous Condition be any thing),

'Mr. SPECTATOR,

Sir,

Your Humble Servant.'

Give me Leave to make you a Present of a Character

not

12, 1711

not yet described in your Papers; which is that of a No. 194. Man who treats his Friend with the same odd Variety Friday, October which a Fantastical Female Tyrant practises towards her Lover, I have for some Time had a Friendship with one of these mercurial Persons: The Rogue I know loves me, yet takes Advantage of my Fondness for him to use me as he pleases: We are by Turns the best Friends, and the greatest Strangers imaginable: Some times you would think us inseparable; at other Times he avoids me for a long Time, yet neither he nor I know why, When we meet next by Chance, he is amazed he has not seen me, is impatient for an Appoint ment the same Evening; and when I expect he should have kept it, I have known him slip away to another Place; where he has sate reading the News, when there is no Post; smoaking his Pipe, which he seldom cares for; and staring about him in Company with whom he has had nothing to do, as if he wonder'd how he came there.

That I may state my Case to you the more fully, I shall transcribe some short Minutes I have taken of him in my Almanack since last Spring; for you must know there are certain Seasons of the Year, according to which, I will not say our Friendship, but the Enjoy ment of it rises or falls: In March and April he was as various as the Weather; In May and Part of June, I found him the sprightliest best-humoured Fellow in the World; In the Dog-days, he was much upon the Indolent; In September very agreeable, but very busie; and since the Glass fell last to changeable, he has made hree Appointments with me, and broke them every one. However I have good Hopes of him this Winter, especially if you will lend me your Assistance to re orm him, which will be a great Ease and Pleasure to,

No. 195,

Saturday, No. 195.

October 13, 1711,

[ADDISON.]

Saturday, October 13,

TH

Νήπιοι, οὐδὲ ἴσασιν, ὅσῳ πλέον ἥμισυ παντός,

Οὐδ ̓ ὅσον ἐν μαλάχῃ τε καὶ ἀσφοδέλῳ μέγ' ὄνειαρ.Hes,

HERE is a Story in the Arabian Nights Tales, of a King who had long languished under an ill Habit of Body, and had taken abundance of Remedies to no purpose. At length, says the Fable, a Physician cured him by the following Method. He took an Hollow Ball of Wood, and filled it with several Drugs, after which he clos'd it up so artificially that nothing appeared. He likewise took a Mall, and after having hollowed the Handle, and that Part which strikes the Ball, he enclosed in them several Drugs after the same manner as in the Ball it self. He then ordered the Sultan, who was his Patient, to exercise himself early in the Morning with these rightly prepared Instruments, 'till such time as he should Sweat. When, as the Story goes, the Virtue of the Medicaments perspiring through the Wood, had so good an Influence on the Sultan's Constitution, that they cured him of an Indisposition which all the Com positions he had taken inwardly had not been able to remove. This Eastern Allegory is finely contrived to shew us how beneficial Bodily Labour is to Health, and that Exercise is the most effectual Physick. I have described, in my Hundred and Fifteenth Paper, from the general Structure and Mechanism of an Human Body, how absolutely necessary Exercise is for its Preservation. I shall in this Place recommend another great Preservative of Health, which in many Cases produces the same Effects as Exercise, and may, in some measure, supply its Place, where Opportunities of Exercise are wanting. The Preservative I am speak ing of is Temperance, which has those particular Ad vantages above all other Means of Health, that it may be practised by all Ranks and Conditions, at any Season or in any Place, It is a kind of Regimen, into which every Man may put himself, without Interruption to Business, Expence of Mony, or Loss of Time. If Exercise

throws