make the application of it to ourselves, according to our several wants, capacities, and defires, by faying only in general, I am. Again, page 27, he thus discourses: "There is more folid joy and comfort, more real delight and fatisfaction of mind, in one fingle thought of God, rightly formed, than all the riches, and honours, and pleafures of this world, put them altogether, are able to afford-Let us then call in all our scattered thoughts from all things here below, and raise them up, and unite them all to the most High God; not apprehending him under the idea, image, likeness of any thing else, but as infinitely greater, and higher, and better than all things; as one exifting in and of himself, and giving effence and existence to all things in the world befides himself; as one so pure and fimple, that there is nothing in him but himself, but effence and being itself; as one so infinite and omnipotent, that wheresoever any thing else is in the whole world, there He is and beyond the world, where nothing else is, there all things are, because He is there; as one fo wist, so knowing, so omniscient, that he at this very moment, and always, fees what all the angels are doing in Heaven; what all the fowls are doing in the air; what all the fishes are doing in the waters; what all the devils are doing in hell; what all the men, and beasts, and the very infects, are doing upon earth; as one powerful and omnipotent, that he can do whatsoever he will, only by willing it should be done; as one so great, so good, so glorious, so immutable, so transcendant, so infinite, so incomprehenfible, so eternal, what shall I fay? So Jehovah, that the more we think of him, the more we admire him, the more we adore him; the more we love him, the more we may, and ought; our highest conceptions of him being as much beneath him, as our greatest services come short of what we owe him. "Seeing therefore we cannot think of God so highly as he is, let us think of him as highly as we can : And for that end let us get above ourselves and above VOL. II. K the world, and raise up our thoughts higher and higher ftill, and when we have got them up as high as poffibly we can, let us apprehend a Being infinitely higher than the highest of them; and then finding ourselves at a loss, amazed, confounded at such an.infinite height of infinite perfections, let us falldownin humble and hearty defires to be freed from these dark prifons wherein we are now immured, that we may take our flight into eternity, and there, (through the merits of our ever blessed Saviour) see this infinite Being face to faee, and enjoy him for ever." A GUARDIAN, Vol. I. No. 74. GOOD-HUMOUR. Instead MAN advanced in years who thinks fit to look back upon his former life, and calls that only life which was paffed with fatisfaction and enjoyment, excluding all parts which were not pleasant to him, will find himself very young, if not in his infancy. Sickness, ill-humour, and idleness, will have robbed him of a great share of that space we ordinarily call our life. It is therefore the duty of every man who would be true to himself, to obtain, if possible, a difposition to be pleased, and place himself in a constant aptitude for the fatisfactions of his being. of this, you hardly fee a man who is not uneasy in proportion to his advancement in the arts of life. An affected delicacy is the common improvement we meet with in those who pretend to be refined above others: They do not aim at true pleasure themselves, but turn their thoughts upon observing the false pleafures of other men. Such people are valetudinarians in society, and they should no more come into company than a fick man should come into the air: If a man is too weak to bear what is a refreshment to men in health, he must still keep his chamber. When any one in Sir Roger's company complains he is out of order, he immediately calls for fome poffet-drink for him; for which reason that fort of people who are ever bewailing their constitution in other places, are the cheerfullest imaginable when he is present. It is a wonderful thing, that so many, (and they not reckoned abfurd) shall entertain those with whomthey converse, by givingthem the history of their pains and aches; and imagine such narrations their quota of the conversation. This is of all others the meanest help to discourse, and a man must not think at all, or think himself very infignificant, when he finds an account of his head-ache answered by another afking what news in the last mail ? Mutual good-humour is a dress we ought to appear in wherever we meet, and we should make no mention of what concerns ourfelves, without it be of matters wherein our friends ought to rejoice: But indeed there are crowds of people who put themselves in no method of pleasing themselves or others: Such are those whom we ufually call indolent perfons. Indolence is, methinks, an intermediate state boween pleasure and pain, and very much unbecoming any part of our life after we are out of the nurse's arms. • Such an aversion to labour creates a constant weariness, and one would think should make existence itself a burden. The indolent man defcends from the dignity of his nature, and makes that being which was rational, merely vegetative : His life confifts only in the mere increase and decay of a body which, with relation to the rest of the world, might as well have been uninformed, as the habitation of a reasonable mind. Of this kind is the life of that extraordinary couple Harry Terfett and his lady. Harry was in the days of his celibacy one of those pert creatures who have much vivacity and little understanding; Mrs. Rebecca Quickly whom he married, had all that the fire of youth and a lively manner could do towards making an agreeable woman. These two people of seeming merit, fell into each other's arms; and paflion being fatiated, and no reason or good-fenfe in each to fucceed it, their life is now at a stand; their meals are infipid, and their time tedious; their fortune has placed them above care, and their lofs of taste reduced them below diverfion. When we talk of these as instances of ir. exiftence, we do not mean, that in order to live, it is neceffary we should always be in jovial crews, or crowned with chaplets of roses, as the merry fellows among the ancients are defcribed; but it is intended by confidering these contraries to pleasure, indolence and too much delicacy, to shew, that it is prudence to preserve a difpofition in ourselves to receive a certain delight in all we hear and fee. This portable quality of good-humour seasons all the parts and occurrences we meet with, in fuch a manner, that there are no moments loft; but they all pass with so much fatisfaction, that the heaviest of loads (when it is a load) that of time, is never felt by ร. Varilas has this quality to the highest perfection, and communicates it wherever he appears: The fad, the merry, the severe, the melancholy, thew a new cheerfulness when he comes among them. At the fame time no one can repeat any thing that Varilas has ever faid, that deferves repetition; but the man has that innate goodness of temper, that he is welcome to every body, because every man thinks he is so to him. He does not feem to contribute any thing to the mirth of the company; and yet upon reflection you find it all happened by his being there. I thought it was whimfically faid of a gentleman, that if Verilas had wit, it would be the best wit in the world. It is certain when a well corrected, lively imagination and good-breeding are added to a sweet difpofition, they qualify it to be one of the greatest blessings, as well as Fleafures, of life. Men would come into company with ten times the pleasure they do, if they were fure of hearing nothing which should shock them, as well as expected what would please them. When we know every perfon that is spoken of, is represented by one who has no ill-will, and every thing that is mentioned, described by one who is apt to fet it in the best light, the entertainment must be delicate, because the cook has nothing brought to his hand but what is the most excellent in its kind. Beautiful pictures are the entertainments of pure minds; and deformities, of the corrupted. It is a degree towards the life of angels, when we enjoy conversation wherein there is nothing represented but. in its excellence; and a degree towards that of dæmons, wherein nothing is shewn but in its degeneraсу. SPECTATOR, Vol. II. No. 100. GOOD-NATURE. MAN AN is subject to innumerable pains and forrows: by the very condition of humanity, and yet, as if nature had not sown evils enough in life, we are continually adding grief to grief, and aggravating the common calamity by our cruel treatment of one another. Every man's natural weight of afflictions is: still made more heavy by the envy, malice, treachery, or injustice of his neighbour. At the th fame time that the storm beats upon the whole species, we are falling. foul upon one another.. Half the mifery of human life might be extinguished, would men alleviate the general curse they lie under, by mutual offices of compaflion, benevolence, and humanity. There is nothing therefore, which we ought more to encourage in ourselves and others, than that disposition of mind which in our language goes under the title of good-nature, and which I shall choofe for the fubject of this day's speculation. Good-nature is more agreeable in conversation than wit, and gives a certain air to the countenance which is more amiable than beauty. It shews virtue in the fairest light, takes off in some measure from the deformity of vice, and makes even folly and impertinence supportable. There is no fociety or conversation to be kept up in the world without good-nature, or fomething which must bear its appearance, and supply its place. For this reason mankind have been forced to invent a kind. of artificial humanity, which is what we express by the word good-breeding. For if we examine thorough VOL. II.. Κ. 2. |