Attonita, quoties, morte ne pereat, timet? Particula nempe est cuique nascenti indita Divinior; quae corpus incolens agit; Hominique succinit, tua est æternitas. Eternitas! O lubricum nimis aspici, Mixtumque dulci gaudium formidine! "Quæ demigrabitur alia hinc in corpora? Quæ terra mox incognita? Quis orbis novus Manet incolendus? Quanta erit mutatio? Hæc intuenti spatia mihi quaqua patent Immensa: sed caliginosa nox premit; Nec luce clarâ vult videri singula. Figendus hic pes; certa sunt hæc hactenus: Si quod gubernet numen humanum genus, (At, quod gubernet, esse clamant omnia) Virtute non gaudere certè non potest : Nec esse non beata, quâ gaudet, potest. Sed quà beata sede? Quove in tempore? Hæc quanta quanta terra, tota est Cæsaris. Quid dubius hæret animus usque adeo? Brevi Hic nodum hic omnem expediet. Arma en induor, [Ensi manum admovens, In utramque partem factu; quæque vim inferant, Et quæ propulsent! Dextera intentat necem ; Vitam sinistra: vulnus hæc dabit manus; Altera medelam vulneris: hic ad exitum Deducit, ictu simplici; hæc vetant mori. Secura ridet anima mucronis minas, Ensesque strictos, interire nescia. Extinguet ætas sidera diuturnior: Etate languens ipse sol obscurus Emittet orbi consenescenti jubar: Natura et ipsa sentiet quondam vices Etatis; annis ipsa deficiat gravis: At tibi juventus, at tibi immortalitas : Tibi parta divum est vita. Periment mutuis Elementa sese et interribunt ictibus. Tu permanebis sola semper integra, Tu cuncta rerum quassa, cuncta naufraga, Jam portu in ipso tuta, contemplabere. Compage rupta, corruent in se invicem, Orbesque fractis ingerentur orbibus; Illasq tu sedebis extra fragmina.'

'It must be so

ACT. V. SCENE I.

CATO alone, &c.

-Plato thou reason'st well-
Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire,
This longing after immortality;

Or whence this secret dread and inward horror,
Of falling into naught? Why shrinks the soul
Back on herself, and startles at destruction?
"Tis the Divinity that stirs within us;

"Tis heaven itself that points out an hereafter,
And intimates eternity to man.

Eternity! thou pleasing, dreadful thought!

· Through what variety of untry'd being,
Through what new scenes and changes must we pass ?
The wide, th' unbounded prospect lies before me;
But shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it.
Here will I hold. If there's a power above us,
(And that there is all Nature cries aloud

Through all her works,) he must delight in virtne;
And that which he delights in must be happy.

But when, or where?This world was made for Cæsar.

I'm weary of conjectures-This must end them.

[Laying his hand on his sword,

'Thus am I doubly arm'd; my death and life,
My bane and antidote, are both before me,
This in a moment brings me to an end;
But this informs me I shall never die.
The soul, secur'd in her existence, smiles
At the drawn dagger, and defies its point.
The stars shall fade away, the sun himself
Grow dim with age, and Nature sink in years;
But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth,
Unhurt amidst the war of elements,

The wreck of matter, and the crush of worlds.'

N° 629. MONDAY, DEC. 6, 1714.

Experiar quid concedatur in illos,

Quorum Flaminia tegitur cinis, atque Latinâ.

Juv. Sat. i. 120.

Since none the living dare implead,
Arraign them in the persons of the dead.

DRYDEN.

NEXT to the people who want a place, there are none to be pitied more than those who are solicited for one. A plain answer with a denial in it is looked upon as pride, and a civil answer as a promise. Nothing is more ridiculous than the pretensions of people upon these occasions. Every thing a man hath suffered, whilst his enemies were in play, was certainly brought about by the malice of the opposite party. A bad cause would not have been lost, if such an one had not been upon the bench; nor a profligate youth disinherited, if he had not got drunk every night by toasting an outed ministry. I remember a tory, who, having been fined in a court of justice for a prank that deserved the pillory, desired upon the merit of it to be made a justice of peace when his friends came into power; and shall never forget a whig criminal, who, upon being indicted for a rape, told his friends, 'You see what a man suffers for sticking to his principles.'

The truth of it is, the sufferings of a man in a party are of a very doubtful nature. When they are such as have promoted a good cause, and fallen upon a man undeservedly, they have a right to be

heard and recompensed beyond any other pretensions. But when they rise out of rashness or indiscretion, and the pursuit of such measures as have rather ruined than promoted the interest they aim at, which hath always been the case of many great sufferers, they only serve to recommend them to the children of violence or folly.

I have by me a bundle of memorials presented by several cavaliers upon the restoration of king Charles II. which may serve as so many instances to our present purpose.

Among several persons and pretensions recorded by my author, he mentions one of a very great estate, who, for having roasted an ox whole, and distributed a hogshead upon king Charles's birth-day, desired to be provided for as his majesty in his great wisdom shall think fit.

Another put in to be prince Henry's governor, for having dared to drink his health in the worst of times.

A third petitioned for a colonel's commission, for having cursed Oliver Cromwell, the day before his death, on a public bowling-green.

But the most whimsical petition I have met with is that of B. B. esq. who desired the honour of knighthood, for having cuckolded sir T. W. a notorious roundhead.

There is likewise the petition of one who, having let his beard grow from the martyrdom of king Charles the first until the restoration of king Charles the second, desired in consideration thereof to be made a privy counsellor.

I must not omit a memorial setting forth that the memorialist had, with great dispatch, carried a letter from a certain lord to a certain lord, wherein, as it afterwards appeared, measures were concerted for the restoration, and without which he verily be

lieves that happy revolution had never been effected; who thereupon humbly prays to be made postmaster-general.

A certain gentleman, who seems to write with a great deal of spirit, and uses the words ' gallantry' and gentleman-like' very often in his petition, begs that (in consideration of his having worn his hat for ten years past in the loyal cavalier-cock, to his great danger and detriment) he may be made a captain of the guards.

I shall close my account of this collection of memorials with the copy of one petition at length, which I recommend to my reader as a very valuable piece.

The Petition of E. H. Esq.

Humbly sheweth,

"THAT your petitioner's father's brother's uncle, colonel W. H. lost the third finger of his left hand at Edgehill fight.

That your petitioner, notwithstanding the smallness of his fortune, (he being a younger brother,) always kept hospitality, and drank confusion to the roundheads in half a score bumpers every Sunday in the year, as several honest gentlemen whose names are underwritten) are ready to testify.

That your petitioner is remarkable in his country, for having dared to treat sir P. P. a cursed saquestrator, and three members of the assembly of divines, with brawn and minced pies upon New year's day.

That your said humble petitioner hath been five times imprisoned in five several county-gaols, for having been a ringleader in five different riots into