I ought not to have neglected a Request of one of my Correspondents so
long as I have; but I dare say I have given him time to add Practice to
Profession. He sent me some time ago a Bottle or two of excellent Wine
to drink the Health of a Gentleman, who had by the Penny-Post advertised
him of an egregious Error in his Conduct. My Correspondent received the
Obligation from an unknown Hand with the Candour which is natural to an
ingenuous Mind; and promises a contrary Behaviour in that Point for the
future: He will offend his Monitor with no more Errors of that kind, but
thanks him for his Benevolence. This frank Carriage makes me reflect
upon the amiable Atonement a Man makes in an ingenuous Acknowledgment of
a Fault: All such Miscarriages as flow from Inadvertency are more than
repaid by it; for Reason, though not concerned in the Injury, employs
all its Force in the Atonement. He that says, he did not design to
disoblige you in such an Action, does as much as if he should tell you,
that tho' the Circumstance which displeased was never in his Thoughts,
he has that Respect for you, that he is unsatisfied till it is wholly
out of yours. It must be confessed, that when an Acknowledgment of
Offence is made out of Poorness of Spirit, and not Conviction of Heart,
the Circumstance is quite different: But in the Case of my
Correspondent, where both the Notice is taken and the Return made in
private, the Affair begins and ends with the highest Grace on each Side.
To make the Acknowledgment of a Fault in the highest manner graceful, it
is lucky when the Circumstances of the Offender place him above any ill
Consequences from the Resentment of the Person offended. A
Dauphin
of
France
, upon a Review of the Army, and a Command of the
King
to alter
the Posture of it by a March of one of the Wings, gave an improper Order
to an Officer at the Head of a Brigade, who told his Highness, he
presumed he had not received the last Orders, which were to move a
contrary Way. The Prince, instead of taking the Admonition which was
delivered in a manner that accounted for his Error with Safety to his
Understanding, shaked a Cane at the Officer; and with the return of
opprobrious Language, persisted in his own Orders. The whole Matter came
necessarily before the King, who commanded his Son, on foot, to lay his
right Hand on the Gentleman's Stirrup as he sat on Horseback in sight of
the whole Army, and ask his Pardon. When the Prince touched his Stirrup,
and was going to speak, the Officer with an incredible Agility, threw
himself on the Earth, and kissed his Feet.
The Body is very little concerned in the Pleasures or Sufferings of
Souls truly great; and the Reparation, when an Honour was designed this
Soldier, appeared as much too great to be borne by his Gratitude, as the
Injury was intolerable to his Resentment.
When we turn our Thoughts from these extraordinary Occurrences in common
Life, we see an ingenuous kind of Behaviour not only make up for Faults
committed, but in a manner expiate them in the very Commission. Thus
many things wherein a Man has pressed too far, he implicitly excuses, by
owning, This is a Trespass; youll pardon my Confidence; I am sensible I
have no Pretension to this Favour, and the like. But commend me to those
gay Fellows about Town who are directly impudent, and make up for it no
otherwise than by calling themselves such, and exulting in it. But this
sort of Carriage, which prompts a Man against Rules to urge what he has
a Mind to, is pardonable only when you sue for another. When you are
confident in preference of your self to others of equal Merit, every Man
that loves Virtue and Modesty ought, in Defence of those Qualities, to
oppose you: But, without considering the Morality of the thing, let us
at this time behold only the natural Consequence of Candour when we
speak of ourselves.
The
Spectator
writes often in an Elegant, often in an Argumentative, and
often in a Sublime Style, with equal Success; but how would it hurt the
reputed Author of that Paper to own, that of the most beautiful Pieces
under his Title, he is barely the Publisher? There is nothing but what a
Man really performs, can be an Honour to him; what he takes more than he
ought in the Eye of the World, he loses in the Conviction of his own
Heart; and a Man must lose his Consciousness, that is, his very Self,
before he can rejoice in any Falshood without inward Mortification.
Who has not seen a very Criminal at the Bar, when his Counsel and
Friends have done all that they could for him in vain, prevail upon the
whole Assembly to pity him, and his Judge to recommend his Case to the
Mercy of the Throne, without offering any thing new in his Defence, but
that he, whom before we wished convicted, became so out of his own
Mouth, and took upon himself all the Shame and Sorrow we were just
before preparing for him? The great Opposition to this kind of Candour,
arises from the unjust Idea People ordinarily have of what we call an
high Spirit. It is far from Greatness of Spirit to persist in the Wrong
in any thing, nor is it a Diminution of Greatness of Spirit to have been
in the Wrong: Perfection is not the Attribute of Man, therefore he is
not degraded by the Acknowledgment of an Imperfection: But it is the
Work of little Minds to imitate the Fortitude of great Spirits on worthy
Occasions, by Obstinacy in the Wrong. This Obstinacy prevails so far
upon them, that they make it extend to the Defence of Faults in their
very Servants. It would swell this Paper to too great a length, should I
insert all the Quarrels and Debates which are now on foot in this Town;
where one Party, and in some Cases both, is sensible of being on the
faulty Side, and have not Spirit enough to Acknowledge it. Among the
Ladies the Case is very common, for there are very few of them who know
that it is to maintain a true and high Spirit, to throw away from it all
which it self disapproves, and to scorn so pitiful a Shame, as that
which disables the Heart from acquiring a Liberality of Affections and
Sentiments. The candid Mind, by acknowledging and discarding its Faults,
has Reason and Truth for the Foundation of all its Passions and Desires,
and consequently is happy and simple; the disingenuous Spirit, by
Indulgence of one unacknowledged Error, is intangled with an After-Life
of Guilt, Sorrow, and Perplexity.
T.
No. 383 |
Tuesday, May 20, 1712 |
Addison |
Criminibus debent Hortos—
Hor.
As I was sitting in my Chamber, and thinking on a Subject for my next
Spectator, I heard two or three irregular Bounces at my Landlady's Door,
and upon the opening of it, a loud chearful Voice enquiring whether the
Philosopher was at Home. The Child who went to the Door answered very
Innocently, that he did not Lodge there. I immediately recollected that
it was my good Friend Sir
Roger's
Voice; and that I had promised to go
with him on the Water to Spring-Garden, in case it proved a good
Evening. The Knight put me in mind of my Promise from the Bottom of the
Stair-Case, but told me that if I was Speculating he would stay below
till I had done. Upon my coming down, I found all the Children of the
Family got about my old Friend, and my Landlady herself, who is a
notable prating Gossip, engaged in a Conference with him; being mightily
pleased with his stroaking her little Boy upon the Head, and bidding him
be a good Child and mind his Book
.
We were no sooner come to the Temple Stairs, but we were surrounded with
a Crowd of Watermen, offering us their respective Services. Sir
Roger
,
after having looked about him very attentively, spied one with a
Wooden-Leg, and immediately gave him Orders to get his Boat ready. As we
were walking towards it,
You must know
, says Sir
Roger
,
I never make use
of any body to row me, that has not either lost a Leg or an Arm. I would
rather bate him a few Strokes of his Oar, than not employ an honest Man
that has been wounded in the Queen's Service. If I was a Lord or a
Bishop, and kept a Barge, I would not put a Fellow in my Livery that had
not a Wooden-Leg.
My old Friend, after having seated himself, and trimmed the Boat with
his Coachman, who, being a very sober Man, always serves for Ballast on
these Occasions, we made the best of our way for Fox-Hall. Sir
Roger
the Waterman to give us the History of his Right Leg, and
hearing that he had left it
at La Hogue
with many Particulars
which passed in that glorious Action, the Knight in the Triumph of his
Heart made several Reflections on the Greatness of the
British
Nation;
as, that one
Englishman
could beat three
Frenchmen
; that we could never
be in danger of Popery so long as we took care of our Fleet; that the
Thames
was the noblest River in
Europe
; that
London Bridge
was a greater
piece of Work, than any of the seven Wonders of the World; with many
other honest Prejudices which naturally cleave to the Heart of a true
Englishman
.
After some short Pause, the old Knight turning about his Head twice or
thrice, to take a Survey of this great Metropolis, bid me observe how
thick the City was set with Churches, and that there was scarce a single
Steeple on this side Temple-Bar.
A most Heathenish Sight!
says Sir
Roger
:
There is no Religion at this End of the Town. The fifty new
Churches will very much mend the Prospect; but Church-work is slow,
Church-work is slow!
I do not remember I have any where mentioned, in Sir
Roger's
Character,
his Custom of saluting every Body that passes by him with a Good-morrow
or a Good-night. This the old Man does out of the overflowings of his
Humanity, though at the same time it renders him so popular among all
his Country Neighbours, that it is thought to have gone a good way in
making him once or twice
Knight of the Shire
. He cannot forbear this
Exercise of Benevolence even in Town, when he meets with any one in his
Morning or Evening Walk. It broke from him to several Boats that passed
by us upon the Water; but to the Knight's great Surprize, as he gave the
Good-night to two or three young Fellows a little before our Landing,
one of them, instead of returning the Civility, asked us
what queer old
Put we had in the Boat, and whether he was not ashamed to go a Wenching
at his Years?
with a great deal of the like
Thames-Ribaldry
. Sir ROGER
seemd a little shocked at first, but at length assuming a Face of
Magistracy, told us,
That if he were a Middlesex Justice, he would make
such Vagrants know that Her Majesty's Subjects were no more to be abused
by Water than by Land.
We were now arrived at
Spring-Garden
, which is exquisitely pleasant at
this time of Year. When I considered the Fragrancy of the Walks and
Bowers, with the Choirs of Birds that sung upon the Trees, and the loose
Tribe of People that walked under their Shades, I could not but look
upon the Place as a kind of
Mahometan
Paradise. Sir
Roger
told me it put
him in mind of a little Coppice by his House in the Country, which his
Chaplain used to call
an Aviary of Nightingales
.
You must understand,
says the Knight,
there is nothing in the World that pleases a Man in
Love so much as your Nightingale. Ah, Mr. Spectator! the many Moon-light
Nights that I have walked by my self, and thought on the Widow by the
Musek of the Nightingales!
He here fetched a deep Sigh, and was falling
into a Fit of musing, when a
Masque
, who came behind him, gave him a
gentle Tap upon the Shoulder, and asked him
if he would drink a Bottle
of Mead with her?
But the Knight, being startled at so unexpected a
Familiarity, and displeased to be interrupted in his Thoughts of the
Widow, told her,
She was a wanton Baggage, and bid her go about her
Business.
We concluded our Walk with a Glass of
Burton-Ale
, and a Slice of
Hung-Beef
. When we had done eating our selves, the Knight called a
Waiter to him, and bid him
carry the remainder to the Waterman that had
but one Leg.
I perceived the Fellow stared upon him at the oddness of
the Message, and was going to be saucy; upon which I ratified the
Knight's Commands with a Peremptory Look.
As we were going out of the Garden, my old Friend, thinking himself
obliged, as a Member of the Quorum, to animadvert upon the Morals of the
Place, told the Mistress of the House, who sat at the Bar,
That he
should be a better Customer to her Garden, if there were more
Nightingales, and fewer Strumpets.
in Bantry Bay
. In Bantry Bay, on May-day, 1689, a French
Fleet, bringing succour to the adherents of James II., attacked the
English, under Admiral Herbert, and obliged them to retire. The change
of name in the text was for one with a more flattering association. In
the Battle of La Hogue, May 19, 1692, the English burnt 13 of the
enemy's ships, destroyed 8, dispersed the rest, and prevented a
threatened descent of the French upon England.
No. 384 |
Wednesday, May 21, 1712 |
Steele |
Hague, May 24. N. S.
The same Republican Hands, who have so often since the Chevalier de St. George's Recovery killed him in our publick Prints, have now reduced the young Dauphin of France to that desperate Condition of Weakness, and Death it self, that it is hard to conjecture what Method they will take to bring him to Life again. Mean time we are assured by a very good Hand from Paris, That on the 20th Instant, this young Prince was as well as ever he was known to be since the Day of his Birth. As for the other, they are now sending his Ghost, we suppose, (for they never had the Modesty to contradict their Assertions of his Death) to Commerci in Lorrain, attended only by four Gentlemen, and a few Domesticks of little Consideration. The Baron de Bothmar having delivered in his Credentials to qualify him as an Ambassador to this State, (an Office to which his greatest Enemies will acknowledge him to be equal) is gone to Utrecht, whence he will proceed to Hanover, but not stay long at that Court, for fear the Peace should be made during his lamented Absence.
Post-Boy, May 20.
I should be thought not able to read, should I overlook some
excellent Pieces lately come out.
My Lord Bishop of St.
Asaph
has just now published some
Sermons
, the
Preface
to which
seems to me to determine a great Point
.—He has, like a good
Man and a good
Christian
, in opposition to all the Flattery and
base Submission of false Friends to Princes, asserted, That
Christianity
left us where it found us as to our Civil Rights.
The present Entertainment shall consist only of a Sentence out of
the
Post-Boy
, and the said
Preface
of the
Lord of St. Asaph
. I
should think it a little odd if the Author of the
Post-Boy
should
with Impunity call Men
Republicans
for a Gladness on Report of
the Death of the Pretender; and treat Baron
Bothmar
, the
Minister of
Hanover
, in such a manner as you see in my Motto.
I must own, I think every Man in
England
concerned to support
the Succession of that Family.
The publishing a few Sermons, whilst I live, the latest of which was preached about eight Years since, and the first above seventeen, will make it very natural for People to enquire into the Occasion of doing so; And to such I do very willingly assign these following Reasons.
First, From the Observations I have been able to make, for these many Years last past, upon our publick Affairs, and from the natural Tendency of several Principles and Practices, that have of late been studiously revived, and from what has followed thereupon, I could not help both fearing and presaging, that these Nations would some time or other, if ever we should have an enterprising Prince upon the Throne, of more Ambition than Virtue, Justice, and true Honour, fall into the way of all other Nations, and lose their Liberty.
Nor could I help foreseeing to whose Charge a great deal of this dreadful Mischief, whenever it should happen, would be laid, whether justly or unjustly, was not my Business to determine; but I resolved for my own particular part, to deliver my self, as well as I could, from the Reproaches and the Curses of Posterity, by publickly declaring to all the World, That although in the constant Course of my Ministry, I have never failed, on proper Occasions, to recommend, urge, and insist upon the loving, honouring, and the reverencing the Prince's Person, and holding it, according to the Laws, inviolable and sacred; and paying all Obedience and Submission to the Laws, though never so hard and inconvenient to private People: Yet did I never think my self at liberty, or authorized to tell the People, that either Christ, St. Peter, or St. Paul, or any other Holy Writer, had by any Doctrine delivered by them, subverted the Laws and Constitutions of the Country in which they lived, or put them in a worse Condition, with respect to their Civil Liberties, than they would have been had they not been Christians. I ever thought it a most impious Blasphemy against that holy Religion, to father any thing upon it that might encourage Tyranny, Oppression, or Injustice in a Prince, or that easily tended to make a free and happy People Slaves and Miserable. No: People may make themselves as wretched as they will, but let not God be called into that wicked Party. When Force and Violence, and hard Necessity have brought the Yoak of Servitude upon a People's Neck, Religion will supply them with a patient and submissive Spirit under it till they can innocently shake it off; but certainly Religion never puts it on. This always was, and this at present is, my Judgment of these Matters: And I would be transmitted to Posterity (for the little Share of Time such Names as mine can live) under the Character of one who lov'd his Country, and would be thought a good Englishman, as well as a good Clergyman.
This Character I thought would be transmitted by the following Sermons, which were made for, and preached in a private Audience, when I could think of nothing else but doing my Duty on the Occasions that were then offered by God's Providence, without any manner of design of making them publick: And for that reason I give them now as they were then delivered; by which I hope to satisfie those People who have objected a Change of Principles to me, as if I were not now the same Man I formerly was. I never had but one Opinion of these Matters; and that I think is so reasonable and well-grounded, that I believe I never can have any other. Another Reason of my publishing these Sermons at this time, is, that I have a mind to do my self some Honour, by doing what Honour I could to the Memory of two most excellent Princes, and who have very highly deserved at the hands of all the People of these Dominions, who have any true Value for the Protestant Religion, and the Constitution of the English Government, of which they were the great Deliverers and Defenders. I have lived to see their illustrious Names very rudely handled, and the great Benefits they did this Nation treated slightly and contemptuously. I have lived to see our Deliverance from Arbitrary Power and Popery, traduced and vilified by some who formerly thought it was their greatest Merit, and made it part of their Boast and Glory, to have had a little hand and share in bringing it about; and others who, without it, must have liv'd in Exile, Poverty, and Misery, meanly disclaiming it, and using ill the glorious Instruments thereof. Who could expect such a Requital of such Merit? I have, I own it, an Ambition of exempting my self from the Number of unthankful People: And as I loved and honoured those great Princes living, and lamented over them when dead, so I would gladly raise them up a Monument of Praise as lasting as any thing of mine can be; and I chuse to do it at this time, when it is so unfashionable a thing to speak honourably of them.
The Sermon that was preached upon the Duke of Gloucester's Death was printed quickly after, and is now, because the Subject was so suitable, join'd to the others. The Loss of that most promising and hopeful Prince was, at that time, I saw, unspeakably great; and many Accidents since have convinced us, that it could not have been over-valued. That precious Life, had it pleased God to have prolonged it the usual Space, had saved us many Fears and Jealousies, and dark Distrusts, and prevented many Alarms, that have long kept us, and will keep us still, waking and uneasy. Nothing remained to comfort and support us under this heavy Stroke, but the Necessity it brought the King and Nation under, of settling the Succession in the House of Hannover, and giving it an Hereditary Right, by Act of Parliament, as long as it continues Protestant. So much good did God, in his merciful Providence, produce from a Misfortune, which we could never otherwise have sufficiently deplored.
The fourth Sermon was preached upon the Queen's Accession to the Throne, and the first Year in which that Day was solemnly observed, (for, by some Accident or other, it had been overlook'd the Year before;) and every one will see, without the date of it, that it was preached very early in this Reign, since I was able only to promise and presage its future Glories and Successes, from the good Appearances of things, and the happy Turn our Affairs began to take; and could not then count up the Victories and Triumphs that, for seven Years after, made it, in the Prophet's Language, a Name and a Praise among all the People of the Earth. Never did seven such Years together pass over the head of any English Monarch, nor cover it with so much Honour: The Crown and Sceptre seemed to be the Queen's least Ornaments; those, other Princes wore in common with her, and her great personal Virtues were the same before and since; but such was the Fame of her Administration of Affairs at home, such was the Reputation of her Wisdom and Felicity in chusing Ministers, and such was then esteemed their Faithfulness and Zeal, their Diligence and great Abilities in executing her Commands; to such a height of military Glory did her great General and her Armies carry the British Name abroad; such was the Harmony and Concord betwixt her and her Allies, and such was the Blessing of God upon all her Counsels and Undertakings, that I am as sure as History can make me, no Prince of ours was ever yet so prosperous and successful, so beloved, esteemed, and honoured by their Subjects and their Friends, nor near so formidable to their Enemies. We were, as all the World imagined then, just ent'ring on the ways that promised to lead to such a Peace, as would have answered all the Prayers of our religious Queen, the Care and Vigilance of a most able Ministry, the Payments of a willing and obedient People, as well as all the glorious Toils and Hazards of the Soldiery; when God, for our Sins, permitted the Spirit of Discord to go forth, and, by troubling sore the Camp, the City, and the Country, (and oh that it had altogether spared the Places sacred to his Worship!) to spoil, for a time, this beautiful and pleasing Prospect, and give us, in its stead, I know not what — Our Enemies will tell the rest with Pleasure. It will become me better to pray to God to restore us to the Power of obtaining such a Peace, as will be to his Glory, the Safety, Honour, and the Welfare of the Queen and her Dominions, and the general Satisfaction of all her High and Mighty Allies.
May 2, 1712.
T.
Dr. William Fleetwood, Bishop of St. Asaph, had published
Four Sermons.
- On the death of Queen Mary, 1694.
- On the death of the Duke of Gloucester, 1700.
- On the death of King William, 1701.
- On the Queen's Accession to the Throne, in 1702,
with a Preface.
8vo. London, 1712.
The Preface which, says Dr. Johnson, overflowed with Whiggish
principles, was ordered to be burnt by the House of Commons. This moved
Steele to diffuse it by inserting it in the
Spectator
, which, as its
author said in a letter to Burnet, conveyed about fourteen thousand
copies of the condemned preface into people's hands that would otherwise
have never seen or heard of it. Moreover, to ensure its delivery into
the Queen's hands the publication of this number is said to have been
deferred till twelve oclock, her Majesty's breakfast hour, that no time
might be allowed for a decision that it should not be laid, as usual,
upon her breakfast table.
Fleetwood was born in 1656; had been chaplain to King William, and in
1706 had been appointed to the Bishopric of St. Asaph without any
solicitation. He was translated to Ely in 1714, and died in 1723.
No. 385 |
Thursday, May 22, 1712 |
Budgell |
Theseâ pectora juncta fide.
Ovid.
I intend the Paper for this Day as a loose Essay upon Friendship, in
which I shall throw my Observations together without any set Form, that
I may avoid repeating what has been often said on this Subject.
Friendship is a strong and habitual Inclination in two Persons to
promote the Good and Happiness of one another.
Tho' the Pleasures and
Advantages of Friendship have been largely celebrated by the best moral
Writers, and are considered by all as great Ingredients of human
Happiness, we very rarely meet with the Practice of this Virtue in the
World.
Every Man is ready to give in a long Catalogue of those Virtues and good
Qualities he expects to find in the Person of a Friend, but very few of
us are careful to cultivate them in our selves.
Love
and
Esteem
are the first Principles of Friendship, which always is
imperfect where either of these two is wanting.
As, on the one hand, we are soon ashamed of loving a Man whom we cannot
esteem: so, on the other, tho we are truly sensible of a Man's
Abilities, we can never raise ourselves to the Warmths of Friendship,
without an affectionate Good-will towards his Person.
Friendship immediately banishes
Envy
under all its Disguises. A Man who
can once doubt whether he should rejoice in his Friends being happier
than himself, may depend upon it that he is an utter Stranger to this
Virtue.
There is something in Friendship so very great and noble, that in those
fictitious Stories which are invented to the Honour of any particular
Person, the Authors have thought it as necessary to make their Hero a
Friend as a Lover.
Achilles
has his
Patroclus
, and
Æneas
his
Achates
. In
the first of these Instances we may observe, for the Reputation of the
Subject I am treating of, that
Greece
was almost ruin'd by the Hero's
Love, but was preserved by his Friendship.
The Character of
Achates
suggests to us an Observation we may often make
on the Intimacies of great Men, who frequently chuse their Companions
rather for the Qualities of the Heart than those of the Head, and prefer
Fidelity in an easy inoffensive complying Temper to those Endowments
which make a much greater Figure among Mankind. I do not remember that
Achates
, who is represented as the first Favourite, either gives his
Advice, or strikes a Blow, thro' the whole
Æneid
.
A Friendship which makes the least noise, is very often most useful: for
which reason I should prefer a prudent Friend to a zealous one.
Atticus
, one of the best Men of ancient
Rome
, was a very remarkable
Instance of what I am here speaking. This extraordinary Person, amidst
the Civil Wars of his Country, when he saw the Designs of all Parties
equally tended to the Subversion of Liberty, by constantly preserving
the Esteem and Affection of both the Competitors, found means to serve
his Friends on either side: and while he sent Money to young
Marius
,
whose Father was declared an Enemy of the Commonwealth, he was himself
one of
Sylla's
chief Favourites, and always near that General.