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man who is related to him, after having reprefented him as a very idle worthlefs fellow, who neglected his family, and fpent most of his time over a bottle, told me, to conclude his character, that he was a member of the Everlasting Club. So very odd a title raised my curiofity to enquire into the nature of a Club that had such a found

ing name; upon which my friend gave me the following account.

THE

HE Everlasting Club confists of a hundred members, who divide the whole twentyfour hours among them in fuch a manner, that the Club fits day and night from one end of the year to another; no party prefuming to rife till they are relieved by thofe who are in courfe to fucceed them. By this means a member of the Everlasting Club never wants company; for though he is not upon duty himself, he is fure to find fome who are; fo that if he be difpofed to take a whet, a nooning, an evening's draught, or a bottle after midnight, he goes to the Club, and finds a knot of friends to his mind.

It is a maxim in this Club, That the fteward never dies; for as they fucceed one another by way of rotation, no man is to quit the great elbow-chair which ftands at the upper end of the table, till his fucceffor is in a readinefs to fill it : infomuch that there has not been a fede vacante in the memory of man.

This Club was instituted towards the end (or as fome of them fay, about the middle) of the civil wars, and continued without interruption

till the time of the great fire*, which burnt them out, and difperfed them for feveral weeks. The steward at that time maintained his post till he had like to have been blown up with a neighbouring houfe, (which was demolished in order to ftop the fire;) and would not leave the chair at last, till he had emptied all the bottles upon the table, and received repeated directions from the Club to withdraw himfelf. This fteward is frequently talked of in the Club, and looked upon by every member of it as a greater man, than the famous captain mentioned in my Lord Clarendon, who was burnt in his fhip because he would not quit it without orders. is said that towards the clofe of 1700, being the great year of jubilee, the Club had it under confideration whether they fhould break up or continue their feflion; but after many fpeeches and debates, it was at length agreed to fit out the other century. This refolution paffed in a general Club nemine contradicente.

It

Having given this fhort account of the inftitution and continuation of the Everlafting Club, I fhould here endeavour to fay fomething of the manners and characters of its feveral members, which I fhall do according to the best lights I have received in this matter.

It appears by their books in general, that, fince their first institution, they have smoked fifty tons of tobacco, drank thirty thousand butts of ale, one thousand hogfheads of red port, two hun

*Anno 1666.

dred

dred barrels of brandy, and a kilderkin of small beer. There has been likewife a great confumption of cards. It is also faid, that they observe the law in Ben Jonfon's Club*, which orders the fire to be always kept in, (focus perennis efto) as well for the convenience of lighting their pipes, as to cure the dampnefs of the Clubroom. They have an old woman in the nature of a veftal, whofe bufinefs it is to cherish and perpetuate the fire which burns from generation to generation, and has seen the glass-houfe fires in and out above an hundred times.

The Everlasting Club treats all other Clubs with an eye of contempt, and talks even of the Kit-Cat and October as of a couple of upstarts. Their ordinary difcourfe (as much as I have been able to learn of it) turns altogether upon fuch adventures as have paffed in their own affembly; of members who have taken the glafs in their turns for a week together, without stirring out of the Club; of others who have smoked an hundred pipes at a fitting; of others who have not miffed their morning's draught for twenty years together. Sometimes they fpeak in raptures of a run of ale in King Charles's reign; and fometimes reflect with aftonishment upon games at whift, which have been miraculously recovered by members of the fociety, when in all human probability the cafe was defperate.

*See the "Leges Convivales" of this Club, in LANGBAINE'S "Lives of English Poets, &c." Art. BEN JONSON.

They

They delight in feveral old catches, which they fing at all hours to encourage one another to moisten their clay, and grow immortal by drinking; with many other edifying exhortations of the like nature.

There are four general Clubs held in a year, at which times they fill up vacancies, appoint waiters, confirm the old fire-maker, or elect a new one, fettle contributions for coals, pipes, tobacco, and other neceffaries.

The fenior member has out-lived the whole Club twice over, and has been drunk with the grandfathers of fome of the prefent fitting members.

C*.

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N° 73. Thursday, May 24, 1711.

-O Dea certe!

VIRG. Æn. i. 332.

O goddefs! for no less you seem.

T is very ftrange to confider, that a creature like man, who is fenfible of fo many weakneffes and imperfections, fhould be actuated by a Love of FAME: that vice and ignorance, imperfection and mifery, fhould contend for praise, and endeavour as much as poffible to make themselves objects of admiration.

But notwithstanding man's effential perfec

By ADDISON, dated, it seems, from Chelfea. See final Note to N°7; N°221, and Note.

tion is but very little, his comparative perfection may be very confiderable. If he looks upon himself in an abstracted light, he has not much to boast of; but if he confiders himself with regard to others, he may find occafion of glorying, if not in his own virtues, at least in the abfence of another's imperfections. This gives a different turn to the reflections of the wife man and the fool. The firft endeavours to shine in himself, and the laft to out-fhine others. The first is humbled by the fenfe of his own infirmities, the laft is lifted up by the difcovery of thofe which he obferves in other men. The wife man confiders what he wants, and the fool what he abounds in. The wife man is happy when he gains his own approbation, and the fool when he recommends himfelf to the applause of those about him.

But however unreasonable and abfurd this paffion for admiration may appear in such a creature as man, it is not wholly to be difcouraged; fince it often produces very good effects, not only as it reftrains him from doing any thing which is mean and contemptible, but as it pushes him to actions which are great and glorious. The principle may be defective or faulty, but the confequences it produces are fo good, that for the benefit of mankind, it ought not to be extinguished.

It is obferved by Cicero, that men of the greateft and the moft fhining parts are the most actuated by Ambition; and if we look into the

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