tations, eating once a-day, and dancing once ayear, for the honour of their respective societies. Another numberless branch of peaceable lawyers, are those young men who being placed at the Inns of Court in order to study the laws of their country, frequent the play-house more than Westminster Hall, and are seen in all public assemblies, except in a court of justice. I shall say nothing of those silent and busy multitudes that are employed within doors in the drawing up of writings and conveyances; nor of those greater numbers that palliate their want of business with a pretence to such chamber practice. If, in the third place, we look into the profession of physic, we shall find a most formidable body of men; the sight of them is enough to make a man serious, for we may lay it down as a maxim, that when a nation abounds in physicians, it grows thin of people. Sir William Temple is very much puzzled to find out a reason why the northern hive, as he calls it, does not send out such prodigious swarms, and overrun the world with Goths and Vandals, as it did formerly: but had that excellent author observed that there were no students in physic upon the subjects of Thor and Woden, and that this science very much flourishes in the north at present, he might have found a better solution for this difficulty than any of those he has made use of. This body of men in our own country, may be described like the British army in Cæsar's time; some of them slay in chariots, and some on foot. If the infantry do less execution than the charioteers, it is because they can not be carried so soon into all quarters of the town, and despatch so much business in so short a time. Besides this body of regular troops, there are stragglers, who without being duly listed and enrolled, do infinite mischief to those who are so unlucky as to fall into their hands. (See No. 108.) There are, besides the above-mentioned, innumerable retainers to physic, who, for want of other patients, amuse themselves with the stifling of cats in an air-pump, cutting up dogs alive, or impaling of insects upon the point of a needle for microscopical observations; beside those that are employed in the gathering of weeds, and the chase of butterflies; not to mention the cockleshell merchants and spider-catchers. When I consider how each of these professions are crowded with multitudes that seek their livelihood in them, and how many men of merit there are in each of them, who may be rather said to be of the science, than the profession; I very much wonder at the humour of parents, who will not rather choose to place their sons in a way of life where an honest industry can not but thrive, than in stations where the greatest probity, learning, and good sense may miscarry. How many men are country-curates, that might have made themselves aldermen of London, by a right improvement of a smaller sum of money than what is usually laid out upon a learned education? A sober frugal person, of slender parts, and a slow apprehension, might have thrived in trade though he starves upon physic; as a man would be well enough pleased to buy silks of one, whom he would not venture to feel his pulse. Vagellius is careful, studious, and obliging, but withal a little thick-skulled; he has not a single client, but might have had abundance of customers. The misfor tune is, that parents take a liking to a particular profession, and therefore desire their sons may be of it. Whereas, in so great an affair of life, they should consider the genius and abilities of their children more than their own inclinations. It is the great advantage of a trading nation, that there are very few in it so dull and heavy, who may not be placed in stations of life, which may give them an opportunity of making their fortunes. A well-regulated commerce is not like law, physic, or divinity, to be overstocked with hands; but, on the contrary, flourishes by multitudes, and gives employment to all its professors. Fleets of merchantmen are so many squadrons of floating shops, that vend our wares and manufactures in all the markets of the world, and find out chapmen under both the tropics. No. 22. MONDAY, MARCH 26. By Steele. -Quodcunque ostendis mihi sic, incredulus odi. -Whatever contradicts my sense I hate to see, and never can believe. HOR. ROSCOMMON. THE word Spectator being most usually understood as one of the audience at public representations in our theatres, I seldom fail of many letters relating to plays and operas. But indeed there are such monstrous things done in both, that if one had not been an eye-witness of them, one could not believe that such matters had really been exhibited. There is very little which concerns human life, or is a picture of nature, that is regarded by the greater part of the company. The understanding is dismissed from our entertainments, our mirth is the laughter of fools, and our admiration the wonder of idiots; else such improbable, monstrous, and incoherent dreams, could not go off as they do, not only without the utmost scorn and contempt, but even with the loudest applause and approbation. But the letters of my correspondents will represent this affair in a more lively manner than any discourse of my own. I shall therefore give them to my reader with only this preparation, that they all come from players, and that the business of playing is now so managed, that you are not to be surprised when I say one or two of them are rational, others sensitive and vegetative actors, and others wholly inanimate. I shall not place these as I have named them, but as they have precedence in the opinion of their audiences. MR. SPECTATOR, Your having been so humble as to take notice of the epistles of other animals, emboldens me, who am the wild boar that was killed by Mrs.Tofts, to represent to you, that I think I was hardly used in not having the part of the lion in Hydaspes given to me. It would have been but a natural step for me to have personated that noble creature, after having behaved myself to satisfaction in the part above-mentioned: but that of a lion is too great a character for one that never trod the stage before but upon two legs. As for the little resistance which I made, I hope it may be excused, when it is considered that the dart was thrown at me by so fair a hand. I must confess I had but just put on my brutality; and Camilla's charms were such, that beholding her erect mien, hearing her charming voice, and astonished with her graceful motion, I could not keep up to my assumed fierceness, but died like a man. 'I am, Sir, your most humble servant, THOMAS PRONE." MR. SPECTATOR, "This is to let you understand, that the playhouse is a representation of the world in nothing so much as in this particular, that no one rises in it according to his merit. I have acted several parts of household stuff with great applause for many years: I am one of the men in the hangings in the Emperor of the Moon; I have twice performed the part of the third chair in an English opera; and have rehearsed the pump in the Fortune Hunters. I am now grown old, and hope you will recommend me so effectually, as that I may say something before I go off the stage; in which you will do a great act of charity, to Your most humble servant, 'WILLIAM SORENE.' MR. SPECTATOR, 'Understanding that Mr. Screne has writ to you, and desired to be raised from dumb and still parts, I desire if you give him motion or speech, that you would advance me in my way, and let me keep on in what I humbly presume I am master, to wit, in representing human and still life together. I have several times acted one of the finest flower-pots in the same opera wherein Mr. Screne is a chair; therefore upon his promotion, request that I may succeed him in the hangings, with my hand in the orange trees. ( Your humble servant, RALPH SIMPLE.' |