1

• recommend the Subject of Male Wi• dowhood to you, and beg of you to ' touch upon it by the firft Opportunity. To thofe who have not lived like Husbands during the Lives of their Spouses, this would be a tastelefs "Jumble of Words; but to fuch (of whom there are not a few) who have enjoy'd that State with the Sentiments proper for it, you will have every Line, which hits the Sorrow, attended with a Tear of Pity and Confolation. For I know not by what Goodness of Providence it is, that every guth of Paffion is a ftep towards the Relief of it; and there is a cer'tain Comfort in the very Act of Sor6 rowing, which, I fuppofe, arifes from a fecret Consciousness in the Mind,

that the Affliction it is under flows 'from a virtuous Caufe. My Concern is not indeed fo outrageous as at the firft Transport; for I think it has • fubfided rather into a soberer State of Mind, than any actual Perturbation of Spirit. There might be Rules formed for Men's Behaviour on this great Incident, to bring them from that Misfortune into the Condition I am at prefent; which is, I think," 'that

that my Sorrow has converted all Roughness of Temper into Meeknefs, Good-nature, and Complacency: But indeed, when in a ferious and lonely Hour I prefent my departed Confort to my Imagination, with that Air of Perfuafion in her Countenance when I have been in Paffion, that sweet Affability when I have ❝ been in Good-humour, that tender Compaffion when I have had any thing ⚫ which gave me Uneafinefs; I confels to you I am inconfolable, and my Eyes guth with Grief as if I had feen her but just then expire. In this • Condition I am broken in upon by a charming young Woman, my Daughter, who is the Picture of what her Mother was on her Wedding-day. "The good Girl ftrives to comfort mes but how fhall I let you know that all the Comfort fhe gives me is to make my Tears flow more eafily? The • Child knows the quickens my Sorrows, and rejoyces my Heart at the fame time. Oh, ye Learned, tell me by 'what Word to fpeak a Motion of the Soul, for which there is no Name. • When the kneels and bids me be comforted, the is my Child; when I take

her

her in my Arms, and bid her fay no more, the is my very Wife, and is the wery Comforter I lament the loss of. I banish her the Room, and weep a loud, that I have loft her Mother, and that I have her.

• Mr. SPECTATOR, I wish it were poffible for you to have a Senfe of these pleasing Perplexities; you might 4 communicate to the guilty part of Mankind, that they are incapable of the Happiness which is in the very "Sorrows of the Virtuous. I

BUT pray fpare me a little long er; give me leave to tell you the manner of her Death. She took leave of all her Family, and bore the vain Ap plication of Medicines with the greateft Patience imaginable. When the Phyficiam told her the muft certainly die, the defined, as well as fhe could, that all who were prefent, except my felf, might depart the Room. She faid the had nothing to fay, for the wasrefigned, and I knew all the knew 'that concerned us in this World: but The defired to be alone, that in the Prefence of God only the might, without Interruption, do her laft • Duty to me of thanking me for all

• my

my Kindness to her; adding, that the hoped in my laft Moments I fhould feel the fame Comfort for my "Goodness to her, as the did in that fhe had acquitted herself with Honour, Truth and Virtue to me.

1 curb my felf, and will not tell you that this Kindness cut my Heart in twain, when I expected an Accufation for fome paffionate Starts of mine, in fome parts of our time toC gether, to fay nothing, but thank me for the Good, if there was any Good fuitable to her own Excellence! All that I had ever faid to · her, all the Circumftances of Sorrow and Joy between us, crowded upon my Mind in the fame Inftant; and when immediately after I faw the Pangs of Death come upon that dear Body which had often embraced with Tranfport, when I faw thofe 'cherishing Eyes begin to be ghaftly, and their laft Struggle to be to fix themselves on me, how did I lofe all Patience? She expired in my Arms, and in my Diftraction I thought I faw her Bofom ftill heave. There was certainly Life yet ftill left; I ❝ cried the juft now fpoke to me: But,

alas!

alas! I grew giddy, and all things moved about me from the Diftemper of my own Head; for the best of Women was breathless, and gone for ever.

NOW the Doctrine I would, methinks, have you raife from this Account I have given you, is, That there is a certain Equanimity in those who are good and juft, which runs into their very Sorrow, and difap· points the Force of it. Though they muft pafs through Afflictions in common with all who are in human Nature, yet their confcious Integrity fhall undermine their Affliction; nay, that very Affliction fhall add Force to their Integrity, from a Reflection of 'the ufe of Virtue in the Hour of Af'fliction. I fat down with a defign

to put you upon giving us Rules how to overcome fuch Griefs as thefe; but I fhould rather advise you to teach Men to be capable of

them.

'YOU Men of Letters have what You call the fine Tafte in their Apprehenfions of what is properly done C or faid: There is fomething like this deeply grafted in the Soul of him

who