this talent alone we see what crowds are drawn around enthusiasts, even destitute of common sense; what numbers converted to Christianity. Folly may sometimes set an example for wisdom to practise; and our regular divines may borrow instruction from even methodists, who go their circuits and preach prizes among the populace. Even Whitfield may be placed as a model to some of our young divines; let them join to their own good sense his earnest manner of delivery.

It will be perhaps objected, that by confining the excellencies of a preacher to proper assurance, earnestness, and openness of style, I make the qualifications too trifling for estimation: there will be something called oratory brought up on this occasion; action, attitude, grace, elocution, may be repeated as absolutely necessary to complete the character; but let us not be deceived; common-sense is seldom swayed by fine tones, musical periods, just attitudes, or the display of a white handkerchief; oratorial behavior, except in very able hands indeed, generally sinks into aukward and paltry affectation.

It must be observed, however, that these rules are calculated only for him who would instruct the vulgar, who stand in most need of instruction; to address philosophers, and to obtain the character of a polite preacher among the polite-a much more useless, though more sought for character-requires a different method of proceeding. All I shall observe on this head is, to entreat the polemic divine, in his controversy with the Deists, to act rather offensively than to defend; to push home the grounds of his belief, and the impracticability of theirs, rather than to spend time in solving the objections of every opponent. "It is ten to one," says a late writer on the art of war,

"but that the assailant, who attacks the enemy in his "trenches, is always victorious."

Yet, upon the whole, our clergy might employ themselves more to the benefit of society, by declining all controversy, than by exhibiting even the profoundest skill in polemic disputes; their contests with each other often turn on speculative trifles; and their disputes with the Deists are almost at an end, since they can have no more than victory, and that they are already possessed of, as their antagonists have been driven into a confession of the necessity of revelation, or an open avowal of atheism. To continue the dispute longer would only endanger it; the sceptic is ever expert at puzzling a debate which he finds himself unable to continue; "and, like an olympic boxer, "generally fights best when undermost."

ESSAY V.

THE improvements we make in mental acquire

ments only render us each day more sensible of the defects of our constitution; with this in view therefore, let us often recur to the amusements of youth; endeavor to forget age and wisdom, and as far as innocence goes, be as much a boy as the best of them.

Let idle declaimers mourn over the degeneracy of the age; but in my opinion every age is the same. This I am sure of, that man in every season is a poor fretful being, with no other means to escape the calamities of the times but by endeavoring to forget them; for if he attempts to resist, he is certainly undone. If I feel poverty and pain, I am not so hardy as to quarrel with the executioner, even while under correction :

I find myself no way disposed to make fine speeches, while I am making wry faces. In a word, let me drink when the fit is on, to make me insensible; and drink when it is over, for joy that I feel pain no longer.

The character of old Falstaff, even with all his faults, gives me more consolation than the most studied efforts of wisdom: I here behold an agreeable old fellow, forgetting age, and shewing me the way to be young at sixty-five. Sure I am well able to be as merry, though not so comical as he-Is it not in my power to have, though not so much wit, at least as much vivacity?-Age, care, wisdom, reflection, be gone-I give you to the winds. Let's have t'other bottle: here's to the memory of Shakespeare, Falstaff, and all the merry men of Eastcheap.

Such were the reflections that naturally arose while I sat at the Boar's head tavern, still kept at Eastcheap. Here, by a pleasant fire, in the very room where old Sir John Falstaff cracked his jokes, in the very chair which was sometimes honored by prince Henry, and sometimes polluted by his immoral, merry companions, I sat and ruminated on the follies of youth; wished to be young again; but was resolved to make the best of life while it lasted, and now and then compared past and present times together. I considered myself as the only living representative of the old knight, and transported my imagination back to the times when the prince and he gave life to the revel, and made even debauchery not disgusting. The room also conspired to throw my reflections back into antiquity: the oak floor, the gothic windows, and the ponderous chimney-piece, had long withstood the tooth of time; the watchman had gone twelve; my companions had all stolen off; and none now remained with me but the landlord. From him I could have

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wished to know the history of a tavern, that had such a long succession of customers; I could not help thinking that an account of this kind would be a pleasing contrast of the manners of the different ages; but my landlord could give me no information. He continued to doze and sot, and tell a tedious story, as most other landlords usually do; and, though he said nothing, yet was never silent: one good joke followed another good joke; and the best joke of all was generally begun towards the end of a bottle. I found at last, however, his wine and his conversation operate by degrees he insensibly began to alter his appearHis cravat seemed quilled into a ruff, and his breeches swelled out into a fardingale. I now fancied him changing sexes; and as my eyes began to close in slumber, I imagined my fat landlord actually converted into as fat a landlady. However, sleep made but few changes in my situation: the tavern, the apartment, and the table, continued as before; nothing suffered mutation but my host, who was fairly altered into a gentlewoman, whom I knew to be dame Quickly, mistress of this tavern in the days of Sir John; and the liquor we were drinking, which seemed converted into sack and sugar.

ance.

"My dear Mrs. Quckly," cried I, (for I knew her perfectly well at first sight) "I am heartily glad to "see you. How have you left Falstaff, Pistol, and "the rest of our friends below stairs! Brave and "hearty, I hope ?" In good sooth, replied she, he did deserve to live for ever; but he maketh foul work on't where he hath flitted. Queen Proserpine and he have quarrelled for his attempting a rape upon her divinity; and were it not that she still had bowels of compassion, it more than seems probable he might have been now sprawling in Tartarus.

I now found that spirits still preserve the frailties of the flesh; and that, according to the laws of criticism and dreaming, ghosts have been known to be guilty of even more than platonic affection: wherefore, as I found her too much moved on such a topic to proceed, I was resolved to change the subject; and desiring she would pledge me in a bumper, observed with a sigh, that our sack was nothing now to what it was in former days: "Ah, Mrs. Quickly, those were 66 merry times when you drew sack for prince Henry: "men were twice as strong, and twice as wise, and "much braver, and ten thousand times more charita❝ble than now. Those were the times! The battle "of Agincourt was a victory indeed! Ever since "that we have only been degenerating; and I have "lived to see the day when drinking is no longer

fashionable. When men wear clean shirts, and ❝ women show their necks and arms: all are degene"rated, Mrs. Quickly; and we shall probably, in ano"ther century, be frittered away into beaus or mon"keys. Had you been on earth to see what I have 46 seen, it would congeal all the blood in your body "(your soul, I mean.) Why, our very nobility now "have the intolerable arrogance, in spite of what is 66 every day remonstrated from the press; our very

nobility, I say, have the assurance to frequent as"semblies, and presume to be as merry as the vul

gar. See, my very friends have scarcely manhood "enough to sit to it till eleven; and I only am left to "make a night on't. Pr'ythee do me the favor to "console me a little for their absence by the story "of your own adventures, or the history of the tavern "where we are now sitting: I fancy the narrative ❝ may have something singular."

Observe this apartment, interrupted my companion, of neat device and excellent workmanship-In Vol. V.

S