author, those little familiar instances and illustrations which are so much admired in the moral writings of Horace and Epictetus. There are very beautiful instances of this nature in the following paffages, which are likewife written upon the same subject: Whoso discovereth fecrets, lojeth his credit, and shall never find a friend to his mind. Love thy friend, and be faithful unto him; but if thou betrayeft his fecrets, follow no more after him. For as a man hath destroyed his enemy, fo bast thou the love of thy friend; as one that letteth a bird go ou of bis hand, so hast thou let thy friend go, and shalt not get him again: Follow after him no more, for he is too far off; he is as a roe escaped out of the Snare. As for a wound it may be bound up, and after reviling there may be reconciliation; but he that betrayeth Secrets is without hope. Among the feveral qualifications of a good friend, this wife man has very justly fingled out conftancy and faithfulness as the principal: To these, others have added virtue, knowledge, difcretion, equality in age and fortune, and as Cicero calls it, morum comitas, a pleafantness of temper. If I were to give my opinion upon fuch an exhausted subject, I should join to these other qualifications a certain equability or evenness of behaviour. A man often contracts a friendship with one whom perhaps he does not find out till after a year's conversation; when on a sudden some latent ill humour breaks out upon him, which he never discovered or fuspected at his first entering into an intimacy with him. There are several perfons, who, in fome certain periods of their lives, are inexpressibly agreeable, and in others as odious and detestable. Martial has given us a very pretty picture of one of this spe cies in the following epigram : Difficilis, facilis, jucundus, acerbus es idem, Nec tecum poffum vivere, nec fine te. Epig. 47. 1. 12. There is no living with thee, nor without thee.. It is very unlucky for a man to be entangled in a friendship with one, who by these changes and viciffitudes of humour is sometimes amiable and fometimes odious. And as most men are at some times in an admirable frame and disposition of mind, it should be one of the greatest tasks of wisdom to keep ourselves well when we are so, and never to go out of that which is the agreeable part of our character.-C. SPECTATOR, Vol. I. No. 68.. I intend the paper for this day as a loose essay upon friendship, in which I shall throw my observations together without any fet form, that I may avoid repeating what has been often faid on this subject. Friendship is a strong and habitual inclination in two perfons to promote the good and happiness of one another. Though the pleasures and advantages of friendship have been largely celebrated by the best moral writers, and are confidered by all as great ingredients of human happiness, we very rarely meet with the practice of this virtue in the world. Every man is ready to give in a long catalogue of those virtues and good qualities he expects to find in the person of a friend, but very few of us are careful to cultivate them in ourselves. Love and esteem are the first principles of friendship, which always is imperfect where either of these two is wanting. As, on the one hand, we are foon ashamed of lov-ing a man whom we cannot esteem; so, on the other, though we are truly sensible of a man's abilities, we can never raise ourselves to the warmths of friendship, without an affectionate good-will towards his perfon. Friendship immediately banishes envy under all its disguises. A man who can once doubt whether he should rejoice in his friend's being happier than himself, may depend upon it that he is an utter stranger to this virtue. There is fomething in friendship so very great and noble, that in those fictitious stories which are invent : ed to the honour of any particular person, the authors have thought it as neceffary to make their hero a friend as a lover. Achilles has his Patrælus, and Æneas his Achates. In the first of these instances we may observe, for the reputation of the subject I am treating of, that Greece was almost ruined by the hero's love, but was preferved by his friendship. The character of Achates suggests to us an observation we may often make on the intimacies of great men, who frequently choose their companions rather for the qualities of the heart, than those of the head, and prefer fidelity in an easy, inoffenfive, complying temper, to those endowments which make a much greater figure among mankind. I do not remember that Achutes, who is represented as the first favorite, either gives his advice, or strikes a blow through the whole Anced. A friendship which makes the least noise, is very often most useful; for which reason I should prefer a prudent friend to a zealous one. Atticus, one of the best men of ancient Rome, was a very remarkable instance of what I am here speaking. This extraordinary perfon, amid the civil wars of his country, when he saw the designs of all parties equally tended to the fubversion of liberty, by constantly preferving the esteem and affection of both the competitors, found means to serve his friend on either fide; and while he fent money to young Marius, whose father was declared an enemy of the commonwealth, he was himself one of Scylla's chief favourites, and always near that General, During the war between Cafar and Pompey, he still maintained the fame conduct. After the death of Cafar, he fent money to Brutus in his troubles, and did a thousand good offices to Antony's wife and friends when that party seemed ruined. Lastly, even in that bloody war between Antony and Auguftus, Atticus still kept his place in both their friendships, infomuch that the first, fays Cornelius Nepos, whenever he was absent from Rome in any part of the empire, writ punctually to him what he was doing, what he read, and whither he intended to go; and the latter gave him constantly an exact account of all his affairs. A likeness of inclinations in every particular is fo far from being requifite to form a benevolence in two minds towards each other, as it is generally imagined, that I believe we shall find some of the firmest friendships to have been contracted between perfons of different humours; the mind being oft pleased with those perfections which are new to it, and which it does not find among its own accomplishments. fides, that a man in fome measure supplies his own defects, and fancies himself at second hand poffefsed of those good qualities and endowments, which are in the poffeffion of Him who in the eye of the world is looked on as his other felf. Be The most difficult province in friendship is the letting a man see his faults and errors, which should, if poffible, be so contrived, that he may perceive our advice is given him not fo much to please ourselves as. for his own advantage. The reproaches therefore of a friend should always be strictly just, and not too frequent. The violent defire of pleasing in the person reproved, may otherwife change into a despair of doing it, while he finds himself cenfured or faults he is not confcious of. A mind that is softened and humanized by friendship, cannot bear frequent reproaches ; either it must quite fink under the oppreffion, or abate confiderably of the value and esteem it had for him who bestows them. The proper business of friendship is to inspire life and courage; and a foul, thus supported, outdoes itself; whereas if it be unexpectedly deprived of these fuccours, it droops and languishes. We are, in some measure, more inexcusable if we violate our duties to a friend, than to a relation; fince the former arife from a voluntary choice, the latter from a neceility to which we could not give our own confent. As it has been faid on one fide, that a man ought not to break with a faulty friend, that he may not 1 1 expose the weakness of his choice; it will doubtless hold much stronger, with respect to a worthy one, that he may never be upbraided for having lost so valuable a treasure which was once in his poffeffion. SPECTATOR, Vol. V. No. 385. Χ. FUTURE STATE. THE defire of knowing future events, is one of the strongest inclinations in the mind of man. Indeed an ability of forefeeing probable accidents is what, in the language of men, is called wisdom and prudence : But, not fatisfied with the light that reason holds out, mankind hath endeavoured to penetrate more compendiously into futurity. Magic, oracles, omens, lucky hours, and the various arts of fuperftition owe their rife to this powerful cause. As this principle is founded in felf love, every man is fure to be folicitous in the first place about his own fortune, the course of his life, and the time and manner of his death. If we consider that we are free agents, we shall difcover the absurdity of fuch inquiries. One of our actions, which we might have performed or neglected, is the cause of another that fucceeds it, and so the whole chain of life is linked together. Pain, poverty, or infamy, are the natural product of vicious and imprudent acts; as the contrary bleffings are of good ones; so that we cannot suppose our lot to be determined without impiety. A great enhancement of pleasure arises from its being unexpected; and pain is doubled by being foreseen. Upon all these, and several other accounts, we ought to rest satisfied in this por|tion bestowed on us; to adore the hand that hath fitted every thing to our nature, and hath not more difplayed his goodness in our knowledge than in our ig norance. It is not unworthy cur observation, that superstitious inquiries into future events prevail more or less, in proportion to the improvement of liberal arts and useful knowledge in the several parts of the world. |