considered, by the reverend and learned prelate that preaches to-morrow before many of the descendants of those who perished on that lamentable day, in a manner suitable to the occasion, and worthy his own great virtue and eloquence.

I shall not dwell upon it any farther, but only transcribe out of a little tract, called the Christian Hero, published in 1701, what I find there in honour of the renowned hero, William III., who rescued that nation from a repetition of the same disasters. His late majesty, of glorious memory, and the most Christian king, are considered at the conclusion of that treatise as heads of the Protestant and Roman Catholic world in the following manner :—

"There were not ever, before the entrance of the Christian name into the world, men who have maintained a more renowned carriage, than the two great rivals who possess the full fame of the present age, and will be the theme and examination of the future. They are exactly formed by nature for those ends to which Heaven seems to have sent them among us. Both animated with a restless desire of glory, but pursue it by different means, and with different motives. To one it consists in an extensive undisputed empire over his subjects, to the other in their rational and voluntary obedience. One's happiness is founded in their want of power, the other's in their want of desire to oppose him. The one enjoys the summit of fortune with the luxury of a Persian, the other with the moderation of a Spartan. One is made to oppress, the other to relieve the oppressed. The one is satisfied with the pomp and ostentation of power to prefer and debase his inferiors; the other delighted only with the cause and foundation of it to cherish and protect them. To one therefore religion is but a convenient disguise, to the other a vigorous motive of action.

(6 For, without such ties of real and solid honour, there is no way of forming a monarch, but after the Machiavelian scheme, by which a prince must ever seem to have all virtues, but really to be master of none; but is to be liberal, merciful, and just, only as they serve his interests; while with the noble art of hypocrisy, empire would be to be extended, and new conquests be made by new devices, by which prompt address his creatures might insensibly give

law in the business of life, by leading men in the entertainment of it.

"Thus, when words and show are apt to pass for the substantial things they are only to express, there would need no more to enslave a country but to adorn a court; for while every man's vanity makes him believe himself capable of becoming luxury, enjoyments are a ready bait for sufferings, and the hopes of preferment invitations to servitude; which slavery would be coloured with all the agreements, as they call it, imaginable. The noblest arts and artists, the finest pens and most elegant minds, jointly employed to set it off with the various embellishments of sumptuous entertainments, charming assemblies, and polished discourses, and those apostate abilities of men, the adored monarch might profusely and skilfully encourage, while they flatter his virtue, and gild his voice at so high a rate, that he without scorn of the one, or love of the other, would alternately and occasionally use both; so that his bounty should support him in his rapines, his mercy in his cruelties.

"Nor is it to give things a more severe look than is natural, to suppose such must be the consequences of a prince's having no other pursuit than that of his own glory; for if we consider an infant born into the world, and beholding itself the mightiest thing in it, itself the present admiration and future prospect of a fawning people, who profess themselves great or mean, according to the figure he is to make amongst them, what fancy would not be debauched to believe they were but what they professed themselves-his mere creatures, and use them as such, by purchasing with their lives a boundless renown, which he, for want of a more just prospect, would place in the number of his slaves, and the extent of his territories? Such undoubtedly would be the tragical effect of a prince's living with no religion, which are not to be surpassed but by his having a false one.

If ambition were spirited with zeal, what would follow, but that his people should be converted into an army, whose swords can make right in power, and solve controversy in belief? And if men should be stiff-necked to the doctrine of that visible church, let them be contented with an oar and a chain, in the midst of stripes and anguish, to con

template on Him whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light.

"With a tyranny begun on his own subjects, and indignation that others draw their breath independent of his frown or smile, why should he not proceed to the seizure of the world? And if nothing but the thirst of sway were the motive of his actions, why should treaties be other than mere words, or solemn national compacts be any thing but a halt in the march of that army, who are never to lay down their arms until all men are reduced to the necessity of hanging their lives on his wayward will; who might supinely, and at leisure, expiate his own sins, by other men's sufferings, while he daily meditates new slaughter and new conquests?

For mere man, when giddy with unbridled power, is an insatiate idol, not to be appeased with myriads offered to his pride, which may be puffed up by the adulation of a base and prostrate world into an opinion that he is something more than human, by being something less: and alas, what is there that mortal man will not believe of himself when complimented with the attributes of God? He can then conceive thoughts of a power as omnipresent as his. But, should there be such a foe of mankind now upon earth, have our sins so far provoked Heaven, that we are left utterly naked to his fury? Is there no power, no leader, no genius, that can conduct and animate us to our death, or our defence? Yes; our great God never gave one to reign by his permission, but he gave to another also to reign by his grace.

"All the circumstances of the illustrious life of our prince seem to have conspired to make him the check and bridle of tyranny; for his mind has been strengthened and confirmed by one continued struggle, and Heaven has educated him by adversity to a quick sense of the distresses and miseries of mankind, which he was born to redress. In just scorn of the trivial glories and light ostentations of power, that glorious instrument of Providence moves, like that, in a steady, calm and silent course, independent either of applause or calumny; which renders him, if not in a political, yet in a moral, a philosophic, an heroic, and a Christian sense, an absolute monarch: who, satisfied with this unchangeable, just, and ample glory, must needs turn

NÓ 517. all his regards from himself to the service of others; for he begins his enterprises with his own share in the success of them; for integrity bears in itself its reward, nor can that which depends not on event ever know disappoint

ment.

"With the undoubted character of a glorious captain, and (what he much more values than the most splendid titles) that of a sincere and honest man, he is the hope and stay of Europe, an universal good; not to be engrossed by us only, for distant potentates implore his friendship, and injured empires court his assistance. He rules the world, not by an invasion of the people of the earth, but the address of its princes; and, if that world should be again roused from the repose which his prevailing arms had given it, why should we not hope that there is an Almighty, by whose influence the terrible enemy that thinks himself prepared for battle, may find he is but ripe for destruction?-and that there may be in the womb of time great incidents, which may make the catastrophe of a prosperous life as unfortunate as the particular scenes of it were successful?-for there does not want a skilful eye and resolute arm to observe and grasp the occasion. A prince, who from—

T.

Troy is no more, and Ilium was a town.-DRYDEN.

N° 517. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 23, 1712.

Heu pietas! heu prisca fides!-
Mirror of ancient faith!

- VIRG. En. vi. 878.

Undaunted worth! Inviolable truth!-DRYDEN

WE

I

last night received a piece of ill news at our club, which very sensibly afflicted every one of us. question not but my readers themselves will be troubled at the hearing of it. To keep them no longer in suspense, Sir Roger de Coverley is dead! He departed this life at his house in the country, after a few weeks' sickness. Sir Andrew Freeport has a letter from one of his correspondents in those parts, that informs him the old man caught a cold at the county-sessions, as he was very warmly pro

moting an address of his own penning, in which he succeeded according to his wishes. But this particular comes from a whig justice of peace, who was always Sir Roger's enemy and antagonist. I have letters both from the chaplain and Captain Sentry, which mention nothing of it, but are filled with many particulars to the honour of the good old man. I have likewise a letter from the butler, who took so much care of me last summer when I was at the knight's house. As my friend the butler mentions, in the simplicity of his heart, several circumstances the others have passed over in silence, I shall give my reader a copy of his letter, without any alteration or diminution.

"HONOURED SIR,

"Knowing that you was my old master's good friend, I could not forbear sending you the melancholy news of his death, which has afflicted the whole country, as well as his poor servants, who loved him, I may say, better than we did our lives. I am afraid he caught his death the last county-sessions, where he would go to see justice done to a poor widow woman, and her fatherless children, that had been wronged by a neighbouring gentleman; for you know, Sir, my good master was always the poor man's friend. Upon his coming home, the first complaint he made was, that he had lost his roast-beef stomach, not being able, to touch a surloin, which was served up according to custom; and you know he used to take great delight in it. From that time forward he grew worse and worse, but still kept a good heart to the last. Indeed we were once in great hopes of his recovery, upon a kind message that was sent him from the widow lady whom he had made love to the forty last years of his life; but this only proved a lightning before death. He has bequeathed to this lady, as a token of his love, a great pearl necklace, and a couple of silver bracelets set with jewels, which belonged to my good old lady his mother. He has bequeathed the fine white gelding that he used to ride ahunting upon to his chaplain, because he thought he would be kind to him; and has left you all his books. He has, moreover, bequeathed to the chaplain a very pretty tenement with good lands about it. It being a very cold day when he made his will, he left for mourning to every man