to be happy all the while this prodigious mafs of fand was confuming by this flow method until there was not a grain of it left, on condition you were to be miferable for ever after? Or, fuppofing that you might be happy for ever after on condition you would be miferable until the whole mafs of fand were thus annihilated at the rate of one fand in a thousand years: which of these two cafes would you make your choice? It must be confeffed in this cafe, fo many thousands of years are to the imagination as a kind of eternity, though in reality they do not bear fo great a proportion to that duration which is to follow them as an unit does to the greatest number which you can put together in figures, or as one of thofe fands to the fuppofed heap. Reafon therefore tells us, without any manner of hefitation, which would be the better part in this choice. However, as I have before intimated, our reafon might in fuch cafe be so overfet by the imagination as to difpose some perfons to fink under the confideration of the great length of the first part of this duration, and of the great diftance of that fecond duration which is to fucceed it. The mind, I fay, might give itself up to that happiness which is at hand, confidering that it is fo very near, and that it would laft fo very long. But when the choice we actually have before us is this, whether we will choofe to be happy for the space of only threefcore and ten, nay, perhaps of only twenty or ten years, I might lay fay of only a day or an hour, and miferable to all eternity; or, on the contrary, miferable for this fhort term of years, and happy for a whole eternity what words are fufficient to exprefs that folly and want of confideration which in fuch a cafe makes a wrong choice? I here put the cafe even at the worst, by fuppofing, what feldom happens, that a courfe of virtue makes us miferable in this life: but if we fuppofe, as it generally happens, that virtue would make us more happy even in this life than a contrary courfe of vice; how can we fufficiently admire the ftupidity or madness of those perfons who are capable of making fo abfurd a choice? Every wife man therefore will confider this life only as it may conduce to the happiness of the other, and cheerfully facrifice the pleafures of a few years to thofe of an eternity. N° 576. Wednesday, August 4, 1714. Nitor in adverfum; nec me, qui cætera, vincit Remember a young man of very lively parts, and of a sprightly turn in converfation, who had only one fault, which was an inordinate *By ADDISON. defire of appearing fafhionable. This ran him into many amours, and confequently into many diftempers. He never went to bed until two o'clock in the morning, because he would not be a queer fellow; and was every now and then knocked down by a conftable, to fignalize his vivacity. He was initiated into half a dozen clubs before he was one-and-twenty; and fo improved in them his natural gaiety of temper, that you might frequently trace him to his lodging by a range of broken windows, and other the like monuments of wit and gallantry. To be short, after having fully established his reputation of being a very agreeable rake, he died of old age at five-and-twenty. There is indeed nothing which betrays a man into fo many errors and inconveniences as the defire of not appearing fingular; for which reason it is very neceflary to form a right idea of fingularity, that we may know when it is laudable, and when it is vicious. In the first place, every man of fenfe will agree with me, that fingularity is laudable, when, in contradiction to a multitude, it adheres to the dictates of confcience, morality, and honour. In these cafes we ought to confider that it is not cuftom, but duty, which is the rule of action; and that we should be only fo far fociable as we are reasonable creatures. Truth is never the lefs fo for not being attended to: and it is the nature of actions, not the number of actors, by which we ought to regulate our behaviour. Singularity in concerns of this kind is to be looked looked upon as heroic bravery, in which a man leaves the fpecics only as he foars above it. What greater inftance can there be of a weak and pufillanimous temper, than for a man to pass his whole life in oppofition to his own fentiments? or not to dare to be what he thinks he ought to be? Singularity, therefore, is only vicious when it makes men act contrary to reason, or when it puts them upon diftinguishing themfelves by trifles. As for the first of thefe, who are fingular in any thing that is irreligious, immoral, or difhonourable, I believe every one will easily. give them up. I fhall therefore speak of thofe only who are remarkable for their fingularity in things of no importance; as in dress, behaviour, converfation, and all the little intercourses of life. In thefe cafes there is a certain deference due to custom; and, notwithstanding there may be a colour of reafon to deviate from the multitude in fome particulars, a man ought to facrifice his private inclinations and opinions to the practice of the public. It must be confeffed that good fenfe often makes an humourist; but then it unqualifies him for being of any moment in the world, and renders him ridiculous to perfons of a much inferior understanding. I have heard of a gentleman in the north of England, who was a remarkable inftance of this foolish fingularity. He had lain it down as a rule within himself, to act in the most indifferent parts of life according to the most abstracted notions of reafon and good fenfe, without without any regard to fashion and example. This humour broke out at firft in many little oddneffes: he had never any stated hours for his dinner, fupper, or fleep; becaufe, faid he, we ought to attend the calls of nature, and not fet our appetites to our meals, but bring our meals to our appetites. In his converfation with country gentlemen he would not make use of a phrafe that was not strictly true: he never told any of them that he was his humble fervant, but that he was his well-wisher, and would rather be thought a malcontent than drink the king's health when he was not dry. He would thruft his head out of his chamber window every morning, and, after having gaped for fresh air about half an hour, repeat fifty verfes as loud as he could bawl them, for the benefit of his lungs; to which end he generally took them out of Homer; the Greek tongue, especially in that author, being more deep and fonorous, and more conducive to expectoration, than any other. He had many other particularities, for which he gave found and philofophical reafons. As this humour still grew upon him, he chofe to wear a turban Inftead of a perriwig; concluding very justly that a bandage of clean linen about his head was much more wholefome, as well as cleanly, than the caul of a wig, which is foiled with frequent perfpirations. He afterwards judiciously obferved, that the many ligatures in our English drefs muft naturally check the circulation of the blood; for which reafon he made his VOL. VIII. I breeches |