choofe? You, perhaps, will think fit to spend < a day abroad in the common entertainments of men of fenfe and fortune; the will think herfelf ill used in that abfence, and contrive at home an expence proportioned to the appear" ance which you make in the world. She is in all things to have a regard to the fortune which the brought you, I to the fortune to which you introduced me. The commerce between you two will eternally have the air of a bargain, between us of a friendship: joy will ever enter into the room with you, and kind wishes attend my benefactor when he leaves it. Afk yourself, how would you be pleafed to enjoy for ever the pleasure of having laid an immediate obligation on a grateful mind? Such will be your cafe with me. In the other marriage you will live in a conftant comparison of benefits, and never know the happiness of conferring or receiving any.

.

It may be you will, after all, act rather in the prudential way, according to the fenfe of the ordinary world. I know not what I think or fay, when that melancholy reflexion comes ⚫ upon me; but shall only add more, that it is in your power to make me your grateful wife, but never your abandoned mistress. T

N° 200. FRIDAY, OCTOBER 19. Vincit amer patriæ. Virg. Æn. 6. ver. 823. The nobleft motive is the public good.

TH

HE ambition of princes is many times as hurtful to themselves as to their people. This cannot be doubted of fuch as prove unfortunate in their wars, but it is often true too of those who are celebrated for their fucceffes. If a fevere view were to be taken of their conduct, if the profit and lofs by their wars could be justly balanced, it would be rarely found that the conqueft is fufficient to repay the coft.

As I was the other day looking over the letters of my correfpondents, I took this hint from that of Philarithmus; which has turned my prefent thoughts upon political arithmetic, an art of greater ufe than entertainment. My friend has offered an effay towards proving that Lewis XIV. with all his acquifitions, is not mafter of more people than at the beginning of his wars; nay, that for every subject he had acquired, he had loft three that were his inheritance: Philarithmus is not mistaken in his calculations, Lewis muft have been impoverished by his ambition.

On the other hand, if it fhould please God to drop from heaven a new people equal in number and riches to the city, I fhould be ready to think their excifes, customs, and house-rent would raife as great a revenue to the crown as would be loft in the former cafe. And as the confumption of this new body would be a new market for the fruits of the country, all the lands, especially those moft adjacent, would rife in their yearly value, and pay greater yearly taxes to the public. The gain in this cafe would be as fenfible as the former lofs.

Whatsoever is affeffed upon the general, is le vied upon individuals. It were worth the while then to confider what is paid by, or by means of, the meanest subjects, in order to compute the value of every fubject to the prince.

:

For my own part, I fhould believe that feveneighths of the people are without property in themfelves or the heads of their families, and forced to work for their daily bread; and that of this fort there are feven millions in the whole ifland of Great-Britain and yet one would imagine that feven-eighths of the whole people should confume at least three-fourths of the whole fruits of the country. If this is the cafe, the fubjects without property pay three-fourths of the rents, and confequently enable the landed men to pay three-fourths of their taxes. Now if fo great a part of the land-tax were to be divided by seven millions, it would mount to more than three fhillings to every head. And thus as the poor are the caufe, without which the rich could not pay this tax, even the pooreft fubject is upon this account worth three fhillings yearly to the prince. !

Again: one would imagine the confumption of feven-eighths of the whole people, fhould pay two-thirds of all the customs and excifcs. And if this fum too fhould be divided by feven millions, viz. the number of poor people, it would • amount to more than feven fhillings to every head and therefore with this and the former fum every poor fubject, without property, except of his limbs or labour, is worth at least ten fhillings yearly to the fovereign. So much then the queen lofes with every one of her old, and gains with every one of her new subjects.

When I was got into this way of thinking, I prefently grew conceited with the argument, and was juft preparing to write a letter of advice to a member of parliament, for opening the freedom of our towns and trades, for taking away all manner of diftinctions between the natives and foreigners, for repealing our laws of parish-settlements, and removing every other obftacle to the increafe of the people, But as foon as I had recollected with what inimitable eloquence my fellow-labourers had exaggerated the mifchiefs of felling the birth-right of Britons for a hilling, of fpoiling the pure British blood with foreign mixtures, of introducing a confufion of languages and religions, and of letting in ftrangers to eat the bread out of the mouths of our own people, I became fo humble as to let my project fall to the ground, and leave my country to increase by the ordinary way of generation.

As I have always at heart the public good fo I am ever contriving schemes to promote it; and I think I may without vanity pretend to have contrived fome as wife as any of the caftle-builders. I had no fooner given up my former project, but my head was prefently full of draining fens and marthes, banking out the sea, and joining new lands to my country; for fince it is thought impracticable to increase the people to the land, I fell immediately to consider how much would be gained to the prince by increafing the land to the people.

If the fame omnipotent power which aadm the world, should at this time raise out of the ocean and join to Great-Britain an equal extent of land, with equal buildings, corn, cattle and other conveniencies and neceffaries of life, but no men, women, nor children, I fhould hardly believe this would add either to the riches of the people, or revenue of the prince; for fince the prefent buildings are fufficient for all the inhabitants, if any of them should forfake the old to inhabit the new part of the island, the increase of houfe-rent in this would be attended with at least an equal decrease of it in the other: befides, we have fuch a fufficiency of corn and cattle, that we give bounties to our neighbours to take what exceeds of the former off our hands, and we will not fuffer any of the latter to be imported upon us by our fellow-fubjects; and for the remaining product of the country it is already equal to all our markets. But if all these things should be doubled to the fame buyers, the owners must be glad with half their prefent prices, the landlords with half their prefent rents; and thus by fo great an enlargement of the country, the rents in the whole would not increase, nor the taxes to the public.

On the contrary I fhould believe they would be very much diminished; for as the land is only valuable for its fruits, and these are all perishable, and for the most part must either be used within the year, or perish without use, the owners will get rid of them at any rate, rather than they fhould waste in their poffeffion; fo that it is probable the annual production of thofe perishable things, even of one tenth part of them, beyond all poffibility of use, will reduce one half of their value. It seems to be for this reafon that our neighbour merchants who ingrofs all the fpices, and know how great a quantity is equal to the demand, destroy all that exceeds it. It were natural then to think that the annual production of twice as much as can be used, muft reduce all to an eighth part of their prefent prices; and thus this extended inland would not exceed one-fourth part of its prefent value, or pay more than onefourth part of the present tax.

It is generally obferved, That in countries of the greatest plenty there is the pooreft living; like the schoolmen's afs in one of my fpeculations, the people almost starve between two meals. The truth is, the poor, which are the bulk of a nation, work only that they may live; and if with two days labour they can get a wretched fubfiftence, they will hardly be brought to work the other four: but then with the wages of two days they can neither pay fuch prices for their provifions, nor fuch excifes to the government.

ov

That parodox therefore in old Hefiod Susu walds, or half is more than the whole, is very applicable to the prefent cafe; fince nothing is more true in political arithmetic, than that the fame people with half the country is more valuable than with the whole, I begin to think there

was nothing, abfurd in Sir W. Petty, when he fancied if all the highlands of Scotland and the whole kingdom of Ireland were funk in the ocean, fo that the people were all faved and brought into the lowlands of Great-Britain; nay, tho' they were to be reimburst the value of their estates by the body of the people, yet both the fovereign and the fubjects in general would be enriched by the very lofs. If the people only make the riches, the father of ten children is a greater benefactor to his country, than he who has added to it 10,000 acres of land and no people. It is certain Lewis has joined vast tracts of land to his dominions: but if Philarithmus fays true, that he is not now malter of fo many fubjects as before; we may then account for his not being able to bring fuch mighty armies into the field, and for their being neither fo well fed, nor clothed, nor paid as formerly. The reafon is plain, Lewis must needs have been impoverished not only by his lofs of fubjects, but by his acquifition of lands. T

N° 201. SATURDAY, OCTOBER 20. Religentem effe oportet, religiofum nefas.

IT

Incerti Autoris apud Aul. Gell. A man should be religious, not fuperftitious. T is of the last importance to feafon the paffions of a child with devotion, which feldom dies in a mind that has received an early tincture of it, Though it may feem extinguished for a while by the cares of the world, the heats of youth, or the allurements of vice, it generally breaks out and difcovers itfelf again as foon as difcretion, confideration, age, or misfortunes have brought the man to himself. The fire may be covered and overlaid, but cannot be intirely quenched and fmothered.

A ftate of temperance, fobriety, and juftice, without devotion, is a cold, lifeless, infipid condi tion of virtue; and is rather to be stiled philofophy than religion. Devotion opens the mind to great conceptions, and fills it with more fublime ideas than any that are to be met with in the mott exalted fcience; and at the fame time warms and agitates the foul more than fenfual pleasure.

It has been obferved by fome writers, that man is more diftinguished from the animal world by devotion than by reason, as several brute creatures discover in their actions fomething like a faint glimmering of reason, though they betray in no fingle circumftance of their behaviour any thing that bears the leaft affinity to devotion. It is certain the propenfity of the mind to religious worship, the natural tendency of the foul to fly to fome fuperior Being for fuccour in dangers and diftreffes, the gratitude to an invisible fuperintendent which arifes in us upon receiving any extraordinary and unexpected good fortune, the acts of love and admiration with which the thoughts of men are fo wonderfully transported in meditating upon the divine perfections, and the univerfal concurrence of all the nations under heaven in the great article of adoration, plainly fhew that devotion or religious worship must be the effect of tradition from fome first founder of mankind, or that it is conformable to the natural light of reafon, or that it proceeds from inftinct implanted in the foul itself. For my part, I look upon all thefe to be the concurrent caufes; but which ever of them thall be affigned as the principle of divine worship, it manifeftly points to a Supreme Being as the first author of it.

I may take fome other opportunity of confidering thofe particular forms and methods of devotion which are taught us by chriftianity; but fhall here obferve into what errors even this divine principle may fometimes lead us, when it is not moderated by that right reafon which was given us as the guide of all our actions.

The two great errors into which a miftaken devotion may betray us, are enthufiafm and fuperftition.

There is not a more melancholy object than a man who has his head turned with religious enthufiafm. A perfon that is crazed, though with pride or malice, is a fight very mortifying to human nature; but when the diftemper arifes from any indifcreet fervours of devotion, or too intenfe an application of the mind to its miftaken duties, it deferves our compaflion in a more particular manner. We may however learn this leffon from it, that fince devotion itself (which one would be apt to think could not be too warm, may diforder the mind, unlefs its heats are tempered with caution and prudence, we should be particularly careful to keep our reafon as cool as poffible, and to guard ourselves in all parts of life against the inuence of paffion, imagination, and conftitution.

Devotion, when it does not lie under the check

of reafon, is very apt to degenerate into enthu fiafm. When the mind finds herfelf very much inflamed with her devotions, the is too much inclined to think they are not of her own kindling, but blown up by fomething divine within her. If the indulges this thought too far, and humours the growing paffion, fhe at laft flings herself into imaginary raptures and ecftafies; and when once the fancies herfelf under the influence of a divine impulfe, it is no wonder if the flights human ordinances, and refufes to comply with any eftablished form of religion, as thinking herfelf directed by a much fuperior guide.

As enthusiasm is a kind of excefs in devotion, fuperftition is the excefs not only of devotion, but of religion in general, according to an old heathen faying, quoted by Aulus Gellius, Religentem effe oportet, religiofum nefas ; a man should be religious, not fuperftitious; for as the author tells us, Nigidius obferved upon this paffage, that the Latin words which terminate in ofus generally imply vicious characters, and the having of any quality to an excess.

An enthufiaft in religion is like an obftinate clown, a fuperftitious man like an infipid courtier. Enthusiasm has fomething in it of madness, fuperftition of folly. Most of the fects that fall fhort of the church of England have in them ftrong tinctures of Enthufiafm, as the Romancatholic religion is one huge overgrown body of childish and idle fuperftitions.

The Roman-catholic church feems indeed irrecoverably loft in this particular. If an abfurd drefs or behaviour be introduced in the world, it will foon be found out and difcarded: on the contrary, a habit or ceremony, though never fo ridiculous, which has taken fanctuary in the church, flicks in it for ever. A Gothic bishop, perhaps, thought it proper to repeat fuch a form in fuch particular fhoes or flippers; another fancied it would be very decent if fuch a part of public devotions were performed with a mitre on his head, and a crofier in his hand. To this a brother Vandal, as wife as the others, adds an antic drefs, which he conceived would allude very aptly to fuch and such mysteries, until by degrees

the whole office has degenerated into an empty show.

Their fucceffors fee the vanity and inconvenience of thefe ceremonies; but instead of reforming, perhaps add others, which they think more fignificant, and which take poffeffion in the fame manner, and are never to be driven out after they have been once admitted. I have seen the pope officiate at St. Peter's, where, for two hours together, he was bufied in putting on or off his different accoutrements, according to the different parts he was to act in them.

Nothing is fo glorious in the eyes of mankind, and ornamental to human nature, fetting afide the infinite advantages which arife from it, as a ftrong, fteady, mafculine piety; but enthusiasm and fuperftition are the weaknesses of human reafon, that expofe us to the derifion and scorn of infidels, and fink us even below the beasts that perish.

Idolatry may be looked upon as another error arifing from miftaken devotion; but because reflexions on that fubject would be of no ufe to an English reader, I fhall not enlarge upon it. L

N° 202. MONDAY, OCTOBER 22.
Sæpe decem vitiis inftructior & horret.

HOR. Ep. 18. lib. 1. ver. 25. Many, though faultier much themselves, pretend Their lefs offending neighbours faults to mend.

HE other day as I paffed along the street,

TH

I faw a sturdy 'prentice-boy difputing with an hackney-coachman; and in an inftant, upon fome word of provocation, throw off his hat and periwig, clench his fift, and ftrike the fellow a flap on the face; at the fame time calling him rafcal, and telling him he was a gentleman's fon. The young gentleman was, it feems, bound to a blackfmith; and the debate arcfe about payment for fome work done about a coach, near which they fought. His mafter, during the combat, was full of his boy's praifes; and as he called to him to play with his hand and foot, and throw in his head, he made all us who stood round him of his party, by declaring the boy had very good friends, and he could truft him with untold gold. As I am generally in the theory of mankind, I could not but make my reflexions upon the fudden popularity which was raifed about the lad; and perhaps with my friend Tacitus, fell into obfervations upon it, which were too great for the occafion; or afcribed this general favour to caufes which had nothing to do towards it. But the young blacksmith's being a gentleman was, methought, what created him good-will from his prefent equality with the mob about him, add to this, that he was not fo much a gentleman, as not, at the fame time that he called him felf fuch, to ufe as rough methods for his defence as his antagonist. The advantage of his having good friends, as his mafter expreffed it, was not lazily urged; but he fhewed himself fuperior to the coachman in the perfonal qualities of courage and activity, to confirm that of his being well allied, before his birth was of any fervice to him.

If one might moralize from this filly fiory, a man would fay, that whatever advantages of fortune, birth, or any other good, people poffefs above the reft of the world, they should fhew collateral eminences befides thofe diftinctions; or those diflinctions will avail only to keep up commori decencies and ceremonies, and not to

proferve

preferve a real place of favour or esteem in the opinion and common fenfe of their fellow-crea

tures.

The folly of people's procedure, in imagining that nothing more is neceffary than property and fuperior circumftances to fupport them in diftinction, appears in no way fo much as in the domeftic part of life. It is ordinary to feed their humours into unnatural excrefcences, if I may fo fpeak, and make their whole being a wayward and uneafy condition, for want of the obvious reflexion that all parts of human life is a commerce. It is not only paying wages and giving commands, that conftitutes a mafter of a family; but prudence, equal behaviour, with readiness to protect and cherish them, is what entitles a man to that character in their very hearts and fentiments. It is pleasant enough to obferve, that men expect from their dependents, from their fole motive of fear, all the good effects which a liberal education, and affluent fortune, and every other advantage, cannot produce in themselves. A man will have his fervant juft, diligent, fober and chafte, for no other reafon but the terror of lofing his mafter's favour; when all the laws divine and human cannot keep him whom he ferves within bounds, with relation to any one of thofe virtues. But both in great and ordinary affairs, all fuperiority, which is not founded on merit and virtue, is fupported only by artifice and ftratagem. Thus you fee flatterers are the agents in families of humourifts, and thofe who : govern themselves by any thing but reason. Make bares, diftant relations, poor kinfmen, and indigent followers, are the fry which fupport the œconomy of an humourfome rich man.

He is

eternally whispered with intelligence of who are true or falfe to him in matters of no confequence, and he maintains twenty friends to defend him against the infinuations of on who would perhaps cheat him of an old coat.

I fhall not enter into further fpeculation upon this fubject at prefent, but think the following letters and petition are made up of proper fentiments on this occafion.

• Mr. Spectator,

I

AM a fervant to an old lady who is governed by one the calls her friend: who is fo familiar an one, that he takes upon her to advise her without being called to it, and makes her uneafy with all about her. Pray, Sir, be pleased to give us fome remarks upon voluntary counsellors; and let these people know that to give any body advice, is to fay to that 'perfon, I am your betters. Pray, Sir, as near as you can, defcribe that eternal flirt and difturber of families, Mrs. Taperty, who is always vifiting, and putting people in a way, as they call it. If you can make her ftay at home one evening, you will be a general benefactor to all the ladies women in town, and particu⚫larly to Your loving friend, SUSAN CIVIL,'

Mr. Spectator,

the best man alive in common fame," difobliges 'fomebody every day he lives; and ftrikes me 'for the next thing I do, becaufe he is out of 'humour at it. If thefe gentlemen knew that they do all the mifchief that is ever done in converfation, they would reform; and I who have been a fpectator of gentlemen at dinner for many years, have feen that indifcretion does ten times more mifchief than ill-nature. But you will reprefent this better than Your abused humble fervant, THOMAS SMOKY."

HAT in many of the families in which

Tyour petitioners live and are employed,

the feveral heads of them are wholly unacquainted with what is bufinefs, and are very little judges when they are well or ill ufed by us your faid petitioners.

That for want of fuch skill in their own af 'fairs, and by indulgence of their own lazinels • and pride, they continually keep about them 'certain mischievous animals called spies.

<

"That whenever a spy is entertained, the peace of that houfe is from that moment banished.

That fpies never give an account of good fervices, but reprefent our mirth and freedom by the words, wantonnefs and diforder.

That in all families where there are fpies, there is a general jealousy and misunderstanding.

That the mafters and miftreffes of fuch 'houfes live in continual fufpicion of their ingenuous and true fervants, and are given up to the management of thofe who are falfe and 'perfidious.

That fuch mafters and miftreffes who entertain fpies, are no longer more than cyphers in their own families; and that we your petitioners are with great difdain obliged to pay all our refpect, and expect all our maintenance from fuch fpies.

"Your petitioners therefore moft humbly pray, that you would reprefent the premises to all perfons of condition; and your petitioners, as in duty bound, fhall for ever 6 pray, &c.

Phebe pater, fi das hujus miki nominis ufum,
Nec falfa Clymene culpam fub imagine celat;
Pignora da, genitor

Ovid. Met. lib. 2. vcr. 36.
Illuftrious parent! fince you don't despise
A parent's name, fome certain token, give,
That I may Clymene's proud boast believe,
Nor longer under falfe reproaches grieve.

ADDISON.

I

T

walks.