credit the reft, and never fuffers any diflurbance afterward from fuch partial reports.

Yet it seems that enemies have been always found by experience the moft faithful monitors; for adverfity has ever been confidered as the ftate in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself, and this effect it must produce by withdrawing flatterers, whose business it is to hide our weaknesses from us, or by giving loofe to malice, and licence. to reproach; or at leaft by cutting off thofe pleafures which called us away from meditation on our own conduct, and repreffing that pride which too eafily perfuades us, that we merit whatever we enjoy.

Part of thefe benefits it is in every man's power to procure to himself, by affigning proper portions of his life to the examination of the reft, and by putting himself frequently in fuch a fituation by retirement and abftraction, as may weaken the influence of external objects. By this practice he may obtain the folitude of adverfity without its melancholy, its inftructions without its cenfures, and its fenfibility without its perturbations.

The neceffity of fetting the world at a distance from us, when we are to take a furvey of ourselves, has fent many from high ftations to the feverities of a monaftick life; and indeed, every man deeply engaged in bufinefs, if all regard to another state be not extinguished, must have the conviction, though, perhaps, not the refolution of Valdeffo, who, when he folicited Charles the fifth to difmifs him, being afked, whether he retired upon difguft, answered that he laid down his commiffion, for no other rea

fon

fon but because there ought to be fome time for Sober reflection between the life of a foldier and his death.

There are few conditions which do not entangle us with fublunary hopes and fears, from which it is neceffary to be at intervals difencumbered, that we may place ourselves in his prefence who views effects in their causes, and actions in their motives; that we may, as Chillingworth expreffes it, confider things as if there were no other beings in the world but God and ourselves; or, to ufe language yet more awful, may commune with our own hearts, and be ftill.

Death, fays Seneca, falls heavy upon him who is too much known to others, and too little to himself; and Pontanus, a man celebrated among the early reftorers of literature, thought the ftudy of our own hearts of fo much importance, that he has recommended it from his tomb. Sum Joannes Jovianus Pontanus, quem amaverunt bone mufe, fufpexerunt viri probi, honeftaverunt reges domini; jam fcis qui fim, vel qui potius fuerim; ego vero te, boff es, nofcere in tenebris nequeo, fed teipfum ut nofcas rogo. "I am Pon"tanus, beloved by the powers of literature, admired "by men of worth, and dignified by the monarchs "of the world. Thou knoweft now who I am, "or more properly who I was. For thee, ftranger, "I who am in darkness cannot know thee, but I "intreat thee to know thyfelf."

I hope every reader of this paper will confider himself as engaged to the obfervation of a precept, which the wisdom and virtue of all ages have concurred to enforce, a precept dictated by philofophers, inculcated by poets, and ratified by faints.

NUMB. 29. TUESDAY, June 26, 1755,

Prudens futuri temporis exitum

Caliginofa nocte premit deus,

Ridetque fi mortalis ultra

Fas trepidet

But God has wifely hid from human fight

The dark decrees of future fate,

And fown their feeds in depth of night;

He laughs at all the giddy turns of state,

HOR.

When mortals fearch too foon, and fear too late. DRYDEN.

Tfre

HERE is nothing recommended with greater frequency among the gayer poets of antiquity, than the fecure poffeffion of the prefent hour, and the difmiffion of all the cares which intrude upon our quiet, or hinder, by importunate perturbations, the enjoyment of thofe delights which our condition happens to fet before us.

The ancient poets are, indeed, by no means unexceptionable teachers of morality; their precepts are to be always confidered as the fallies of a genius, intent rather upon giving pleasure than inftruction, eager to take every advantage of infinuation, and provided the paffions can be engaged on its fide, very little folicitous about the fuffrage of reafon.

The darkness and uncertainty through which the heathens were compelled to wander in the pursuit of happiness, may, indeed, be alleged as an excufe for many of their feducing invitations to immediate enjoyment, which the moderns, by whom they have been imitated, have not to plead. It is no wonder

that

that fuch as had no promife of another state should eagerly turn their thoughts upon the improvement of that which was before them; but furely those who are acquainted with the hopes and fears of eternity, might think it neceffary to put fome restraint upon their imagination, and reflect that by echoing the fongs of the ancient bacchanals, and tranfmitting the maxims of past debauchery, they not only prove that they want invention, but virtue, and fubmit to the fervility of imitation only to copy that of which the writer, if he was to live now, would often be afhamed.

Yet as the errors and follies of a great genius are feldom without fome radiations of understanding, by which meaner minds may be enlightened, the incitements to pleasure are, in thofe authors, generally mingled with fuch reflections upon life, as well deferve to be confidered diftinctly from the purposes for which they are produced, and to be treasured up as the fettled conclufions of extenfive obfervation, acute fagacity, and mature experience.

It is not without true judgment that on these occafions they often warn their readers against enquiries into futurity, and folicitude about events which lie hid in caufes yet unactive, and which time has not brought forward into the view of reafon. An idle and thoughtless refignation to chance, without any ftruggle against calamity, or endeavour after advantage, is indeed below the dignity of a reafonable being, in whofe power providence has put a great part even of his present happiness; but it fhews an equal ignorance of our proper fphere, to harass our thoughts with conjectures about things not yet

in being. How can we regulate events, of which we yet know not whether they will ever happen? And why should we think, with painful anxiety, about that on which our thoughts can have no influence?

It is a maxim commonly received, that a wife man is never surprised; and, perhaps, this exemption from astonishment may be imagined to proceed from fuch a profpect into futurity, as gave previous intimation of thofe evils which often fall unexpected upon others that have lefs forefight. But the truth is, that things to come, except when they approach very nearly, are equally hidden from men of all degrees of understanding; and if a wife man is not amazed at fudden occurrences, it is not that he has thought more, but lefs upon futurity. He never confidered things not yet exifting as the proper objects of his attention; he never indulged dreams till he was deceived by their phantoms, nor ever realized non-entities to his mind. He is not furprised because he is not disappointed, and he escapes difappointment because he never forms any expectations.

The concern about things to come, that is fo justly cenfured, is not the refult of those general reflections on the variablenefs of fortune, the uncertainty of life, and the univerfal infecurity of all human acquifitions, which must always be fuggefled by the view of the world; but fuch a desponding anticipation of misfortune, as fixes the mind upon fcenes of gloom and melancholy, and makes fear predominate in every imagination.

Anxiety of this kind is nearly of the same nature with jealoufy in love, and fufpicion in the general

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