nice smell?" I might answer perhaps "that I cared as little to see myself nasty as that others should see me in that condition." But what if it were in the dark? Why even then, though I had neither nose nor eyes, my sense of the matter would still be the same: my nature would rise at the thought of what was sordid; or if it did not, I should have a wretched nature indeed, and hate myself for a beast. Honor myself I never could, whilst I had no better a sense of what in reality I owed myself, and what became me as a human creature.

Much in the same manner have I heard it asked, Why should a man be honest in the dark? What a man must be to ask this question I will not say. But for those who have no better a reason for being honest than the fear of a gibbet or a jail, I should not, I confess, much covet their company or acquaintance. And if any guardian of mine who had kept his trust, and given me back my estate when I came of age, had been discovered to have acted thus through fear only of what might happen to him, I should for my own part undoubtedly continue civil and respectful to him; but for my opinion of his worth, it would be such as the Pythian god had of his votary, who devoutly feared him, and therefore restored to a friend what had been deposited in his hands:

Reddidit ergo metu, non moribus; et tamen omnem

Vocem adyti dignam templo, veramquc probavit,
Extinctus tota pariter cum prole domoque.1

I know very well that many services to the public are done merely for the sake of a gratuity; and that informers in particular are to be taken care of, and sometimes made pensioners of state. But I must beg pardon for the particular thoughts I may have of these gentlemen's merit, and shall never bestow my esteem on any other than the voluntary discoverers of villainy and hearty prosecutors of their country's interest. And in this respect, I know nothing greater or nobler than the undertaking and managing some important accusation, by which some high criminal of state, or some formed body of conspirators against the public, may be arraigned and brought to punishment, through the honest zeal and public affection of a private

man.

1 "He made restitution, therefore, through fear, not morality; and yet proved the whole oracle as worthy of the temple and true, being destroyed completely, together with his children and house."

I know, too, that the mere vulgar of mankind often stand in need of such a rectifying object as the gallows before their eyes. Yet I have no belief that any man of a liberal education, or common honesty, ever needed to have recourse to this idea in his mind, the better to restrain him from playing the knave. And if a saint had no other virtue than what was raised in him by the same objects of reward and punishment, in a more distant state, I know not whose love or esteem he might gain besides, but for my own part I should never think him worthy of mine....

ADVICE TO AN AUTHOR

... However difficult or desperate it may appear in any artist to endeavor to bring perfection into his work, if he has not at least the idea of perfection to give him aim, he will be found very defective and mean in performance. Though his intention be to please the world, he must nevertheless be, in a manner, above it, and fix his eye upon that consummate grace, that beauty of nature, and that perfection of numbers, which the rest of mankind, feeling only by the effect whilst ignorant of the cause, term the je ne sais quoi, the unintelligible or the I know not what, and suppose to be a kind of charm of enchantment, of which the artist himself can give no account.

But here I find I am tempted to do what I have myself condemned. Hardly can I forbear making some apology for my frequent recourse to the rules of common artists, to the masters of exercise, to the academies of painters, statuaries, and to the rest of the virtuoso tribe. But in this I am so fully satisfied I have reason on my side, that, let custom be ever so strong against me, I had rather repair to these inferior schools to search for truth and nature, than to some other places where higher arts and sciences are professed.

I am persuaded that to be a virtuoso (so far as befits a gentleman) is a higher step towards the becoming a man of virtue and good sense, than the being what in this age we call a scholar. For even rude nature itself, in its primitive simplicity, is a better guide to judgment than improved sophistry and pedantic learning. The faciuntne intellegendo, ut nihil intellegant1 will be ever applied by men of discernment and free thought to such

1 "Do they not bring it about by their knowingness that they know nothing at all?” (Terence.)

gic, such principles, such forms and rudiments of knowledge, as are established in certain schools of literature and science. The case is sufficiently understood even by those who are unwilling to confess the truth of it. Effects betray their causes. And the known turn and figure of those understandings which sprout from nurseries of this kind, give a plain idea of what is judged on this occasion. 'Tis no wonder if, after so wrong a ground of education, there appears to be such need of redress and amendment from that excellent school which we call the world. The mere amusements of gentlemen are found more improving than the profound researches of pedants; and in the management of our youth we are forced to have recourse to the former, as an antidote against the genius peculiar to the latter. If the formalists of this world were erected into patentees with a sole commission of authorship, we should undoubtedly see such writing in our days as would either wholly wean us from all books in general, or at least from all such as were the product of our own nation under such a subordinate and conforming government.

However this may prove, there can be no kind of writing which relates to men and manners where it is not necessary for the author to understand poetical and moral truth, the beauty of sentiments, the sublime of characters, and carry in his eye the model or exemplar of that natural grace which gives to every action its attractive charm. If he has naturally no eye or ear for these interior numbers, 't is not likely he should be able to judge better of that exterior proportion and symmetry of composition which constitutes a legitimate piece.

Could we once convince ourselves of what is in itself so evident, that in the very nature of things there must of necessity be the foundation of a right and wrong taste, as well in respect of inward characters and features as of outward person, behavior, and action, we should be far more ashamed of ignorance and wrong judgment in the former than in the latter of these subjects. Even in the arts, which are mere imitations of that outward grace and beauty, we not only confess a taste, but make it a part of refined breeding to discover amidst the many false manners and ill styles the true and natural one, which represents the real beauty and Venus of the kind. 'Tis the like mora! grace and Venus which, discovering itself in the turns of charac

ter and the variety of human affection, is copied by the writing artist. If he knows not this Venus, these graces, nor was ever struck with the beauty, the decorum of this inward kind, he can neither paint advantageously after the life nor in a feigned subject where he has full scope. For never can he, on these terms, represent merit and virtue, or mark deformity and blemish. Never can he with justice and true proportion assign the boundaries of either part, or separate the distant characters. The schemes must be defective, and the draughts confused, where the standard is weakly established and the measure out of use. Such a designer, who has so little feeling of these proportions, so little consciousness of this excellence or these perfections, will never be found able to describe a perfect character; or, what is more according to art, express the effect and force of this perrection from the result of various and mixed characters of life.

And thus the sense of inward numbers, the knowledge and practice of the social virtues, and the familiarity and favor of the moral graces, are essential to the character of a deserving artist and just favorite of the Muses. Thus are the Arts and Virtues mutually friends; and thus the science of virtuosi and that of virtue itself become, in a manner, one and the same.

One who aspires to the character of a man of breeding and politeness is careful to form his judgment of arts and sciences upon right models of perfection. If he travels to Rome, he inquires which are the truest pieces of architecture, the best remains of statues, the best paintings of a Raphael or a Caraccio. However antiquated, rough, or dismal they may appear to him at first sight, he resolves to view them over and over, till he has brought himself to relish them, and finds their hidden graces and perfections. He takes particular care to turn his eye from everything which is gaudy, luscious, and of a false taste. Nor is he less careful to turn his ear from every sort of music besides that which is of the best manner and truest harmony.

'T were to be wished we had the same regard to a right taste in life and manners. What mortal being, once convinced of a difference in inward character, and of a preference due to one kind above another, would not be concerned to make his own the best? If civility and humanity be a taste; if brutality, insolence, riot, be in the same manner a taste, who, if he could reflect, would not choose to form himself on the amiable and

agreeable rather than the odious and perverse model? Who would not endeavor to force nature as well in this respect as in what relates to a taste or judgment in other arts and sciences? For in each place the force on nature is used only for its redress. If a natural good taste be not already formed in us, why should not we endeavor to form it, and cultivate it till it become natural?

"I like! I fancy! I admire! How? By accident, or as I please? No. But I learn to fancy, to admire, to please, as the subjects themselves are deserving, and can bear me out. Otherwise I like at this hour but dislike the next. I shall be weary of my pursuit, and, upon experience, find little pleasure in the main, if my choice and judgment in it be from no other rule than that single one, because I please. Grotesque and monstrous figures often please. Cruel spectacles and barbarities are also found to please, and, in some tempers, to please beyond all other subjects. But is this pleasure right? And shall I follow it if it presents? not strive with it, or endeavor to prevent its growth or prevalency in my temper? How stands the case in a more soft and flattering kind of pleasure? Effeminacy pleases me. The Indian figures, the Japan work, the enamel strikes my eye. The luscious colors and glossy paint gain upon my fancy. A French or Flemish style is highly liked by me at first sight, and I pursue my liking. But what ensues? Do I not forever forfeit my good relish? How is it possible I should thus come to taste the beauties of an Italian master, or of a hand happily formed on nature and the ancients? 'Tis not by wantonness and humor that I shall attain my end and arrive at the enjoyment I propose. The art itself is severe, the rules rigid. And if I expect the knowledge should come to me by accident, or in play, I shall be grossly deluded, and prove myself, at best, a mock-virtuoso or mere pedant of the kind."

Here therefore we have once again exhibited our moral science in the same method and manner of soliloquy as above. To this correction of humor and formation of a taste, our reading, if it be of the right sort, must principally contribute. Whatever company we keep, or however polite and agreeable their characters may be with whom we converse or correspond, if the authors we read are of another kind, we shall find our palate strangely turned their way. We are the unhappier in this respect for being scholars, if our studies be ill chosen. Nor can I,