taken pains in perfonating the paffions, I have to-night acted only an Appetite. The The part I 'played is THIRST, but it is reprefented as writ'ten rather by a drayman than a poet. I come in ' with a tub about me, that tub hung with quart pots, with a full gallon at my mouth. I am afhamed to tell you that I pleased very much, ' and this was introduced as a madness; but fure it was not human madnefs, for a mule or an afs may have been as dry as ever I was in my life. 'I am, SIR, Your moft obedient and humble fervant." From the Savoy in the Strand. Mr. SPECTATOR, F IF you can read it with dry eyes, I give you this trouble to acquaint you, that I am the ' unfortunate king Latinus, and I believe I am 'the first prince that dated from this palace fince John of Gaunt. Such is the uncertainty ' of all human greatness, that I who lately never 'moved without a guard, am now preffed as a 'common foldier, and am to fail with the first 'fair wind against my brother Lewis of France. It is a very hard thing to put off a character 'which one has appeared in with applaufe. This I experienced fince the lofs of my diadem; for upon quarrelling with another recruit, I spoke my indignation out of my part in recitativo; "Moft audacious flave, "Dar'ft thou an angry monarch's fury brave?" The words were no fooner out of when a ferjeant knocked me down, and afked me if I had a mind to mutiny, in talking things nobody understood. You fee, Sir, my unhappy circumstances; and if by your mediation you can procure a fubfidy for a prince (who never failed to make all that beheld him merry at his appearance) you will merit the • thanks of • Your friend, • The King of Latium*. ADVERTISEMENT. For the good of the Public. Within two doors of the Masquerade lives an eminent Italian chirurgeon, arrived from the carnival at Venice, of great experience in private cures. Accommodations are provided, and perfons admitted in their mafquing habits. He has cured fince his coming hither, in less than a fortnight, four fearamouches, a mountebank doctor, two Turkish ballas, three nuns, and a morris-dancer. Venienti occurrite morbo. N. B. Any perfon may agree by the great, and be kept in repair by the year. The doctor draws teeth without pulling off your mafque. Rt. *See "Camilla," an Opera, 4to. 1706 and 1709. + By STEELE. See final Note to N°5, and N° 324, Note ad finem, on Signature T. * *A Treatife concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, Part I. Wherein the chief caufes of error and difficulty in the Sciences, with the grounds of Scepticism, Atheism, and Irreligion, are enquired into. By George Berkeley, M. A. Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin. SPECT. in folio, N° 20. See GUARDIAN, " Bp. BERKELEY's Papers," paffim. N° 23. N° 23. Tuesday, March 27, 1711. Sevit atrox Volfcens, nec teli confpicit ufquam Fierce Volfcens foams with rage, and gazing round TH DRYDEN. HERE is nothing that more betrays a bafe ungenerous fpirit, than the giving of fecret ftabs to a man's reputation; lampoons and fatires, that are written with wit and spirit, are like poisoned darts, which not only inflict a wound, but make it incurable. For this reafon I am very much troubled when I fee the talents of humour and ridicule in the poffeffion of an ill-natured man. There cannot be a greater gratification to a barbarous and inhuman wit, The following endorsement at the top of this Paper, N° 23, is in a set of the Spectator, in 12mo. of the edition in 1712, which contains fome MS. notes by a Spanish merchant, who lived at the time of the original publication: "The Character of Dr. SwIFT." This was Mr. Blundel's opinion, and whether it was wellgrounded, ill-grounded, or ungrounded, probably he was not fingular in the thought. The intimacy between SWIFT, STEELE, and ADDISON was now over; and that they were about this time eftranged, appears from SWIFT's own teftimony, dated March 16, 1710-11. See SWIFT's Works, Edit. cr. 8vo. Vol. xxii. p. 188. See N° 509, BLUNDEL'S MS. Note; et paffim. than to ftir up forrow in the heart of a private perfon, to raise uneafinefs among near relations, and to expose whole families to derifion, at the fame time that he remains unfeen and undiscovered. If, befides the accomplishments of being witty and ill-natured, a man is vicious into the bargain, he is one of the most mischievous creatures that can enter into a civil fociety. His fatire will then chiefly fall upon those who ought to be the most exempt from it. Virtue, merit, and every thing that is praife-worthy, will be made the fubject of ridicule and buffoonry. It is impoffible to enumerate the evils which arife from these arrows that fly in the dark, and I know no other excufe that is or can be made for them, than that the wounds they give are only imaginary, and produce nothing more than a fecret fhame or forrow in the mind of the fuffering perfon. It must indeed be confessed, that a lampoon or a fatire do not carry in them robbery or murder; but at the fame time how many are there that would not rather lofe a confiderable fum of money, or even life itself, than be fet up as a mark of infamy and derifion? and in this cafe a man fhould confider, that an injury is not to be measured by the notions of him that gives, but of him that receives it. Those who can put the best countenance upon the outrages of this nature which are offered them, are not without their fecret anguish. I have often obferved a paflage in Socrates's behaviour at his death, in a light wherein none of the upon 133 the critics have confidered it. That excellent man entertaining his friends, a little before he drank the bowl of poison, with a discourse on the Immortality of the soUL, at his entering upon it, fays, that he does not believe any the most comic genius can cenfure him for talking fuch a fubject at fuch a time. This paffage, I think, evidently glances upon Ariftophanes, who writ a comedy on purpose to ridicule the difcourfes of that Divine Philofopher. It has been obferved by many writers, that Socrates was fo little moved at this piece of buffoonry, that he was feveral times prefent at its being acted upon the ftage, and never expreffed the leaft refentment of it. But with fubmiffion, I think the remark I have here made fhews us, that this unworthy treatment made an impreffion upon his mind, though he had been too wife to difcover it. When Julius Cæfar was lampooned by Catullus, he invited him to fupper, and treated him with fuch a generous civility, that he made the poet his friend ever after. Cardinal Mazarine gave the fame kind of treatment to the learned Quillet who had reflected upon his Eminence in a famous Latin poem. The Cardinal fent for him, and after fome kind expoftulations upon what he had written, affured him of his esteem, and difmiffed him with a promife of the next good abbey that fhould fall, which he accordingly conferred upon him in a few months after. This had fo good an effect upon the author, that he dedicated the fecond edition of his book K 3 |