beautiful Desdemona violently enamoured of a gallant foldier, a Moor, and already declin'd into the vale of years.' Mr. Addison calls perfonal courage active fortitude. Ariftotle, in his Ethics, afcribes to courage the first place in his enumeration of moral virtues; and with reafon, for nothing is more precarious than the virtue of a coward: he shrinks at the approach of danger or difficulty, and yields to temptation for want of refolution to refift it. The best proof of real courage is to dare, in every fituation, to be just to our own principles, to ourfelves, to our connections, and to the world. Men, fo fortified, may fay with Horace : Si fractus illabatur orbis, Beneath the crush of worlds undaunted he Virtue in our own Power. Roderigo. What fhould I do? I confefs, it is my fhame to be fo fond; but it is not in virtue to amend it. Iago. Virtue? a fig! 'tis in ourselves, that we are thus, or thus. Our bodies are our gardens; to the which, our wills are gardeners: fo that if we will plant nettles, or fow lettuce; fet hyffop, and weed up thyme; fupply it with one gender of herbs, or diftract it with many; either to have it steril with idleness, or manured with industry; why, the power and corrigible authority of this lies in our wills. If the balance of our lives had not one scale of reason to poise another of fenfuality, the blood and baseness of our natures would conduct us to most prepofterous conclufions. But we have reafon, to cool our raging motions, our carnal ftings, our unbitted lufts; whereof I take this, that you call love, to be a fect * or scyon. The plea urged by Roderigo, for remaining ftill under the dominion of an unlawful paffion, is framed upon a fatal and too prevalent error, that virtue is a peculiar gift of Heaven, 6 to particularly chofen perfons. Now, although it be true, as an apostle affures us, that every good and every perfect gift is from Above, and cometh down from the Father of Lights † ; yet these gifts are not denied to fome, and given to others, by a partial and capricious Being, but may be obtained by all who are fincerely difpofed to receive and to cultivate them. No man is neceffarily wicked, or wicked because God has denied him the power of being virtuous; and, indeed, one would almoft imagine that, in the conclufion of Iago's fpeech, Shakfpeare had in idea another declaration of the fame apoftle, Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own luft, and enticed.' -In this fpeech, moreover, it is obfervable, that as Shakspeare frequently makes his fools talk fenfe, in like manner, he often makes his villains inculcate the fineft leffons of morality. Iago, in his reply, reafons very juity against this dangerous and difcouraging doctrine of partial grace. And as indolent minds may be apt to conclude it a vain task to reftrain their paffions, or refift their temptations, without fuch an innate and fupernatural endowment, I cannot but here quote the fentiments of a late writer, as both appofite and instructive: ‹ The difficulties we apprehend, more than those we find, in the ftrife with all our paffions, is the only thing that prevents philofophy, or virtue, from being commonly attainable in general life. What makes the difference be tween a chafte woman and a frail one? Meeting with a beloved Wife. granted by special favour, as it were, If after every tempeft come fuch calmnefs, * A fect is what the more modern gardeners call a cutting, + James i. 17, IIb, verfe 14. May the winds blow till they have waken'd death! And let the labouring bark climb hills of feas, Olympus high; and duck again as low As hell's from heaven! If it were now to die, 'Twere now to be most happy; for, I My foul hath her content fo abfolute, Lord Kames obferves, in his Elements of Criticifm, that the fentiment in this paffage is too ftrong to be fuggefted by fo flight a joy as that of meeting after a florm at fea. This obfervation is certainly unfounded : for it must be difficult to conceive, that a meeting after a ftorm at sea, even between indifferent perfons, can, with any propriety, be termed a flight joy. This cenfure appears the more exceptionable, if we confider the vehemence of Othello's character; and that the meeting was between him and his beloved Defdemona, his new-married bride, who had just efcaped a dreadful tempeft, and whom he did not expect to find on fhore: for, in the opening of the fpeech, he fays: It gives me wonder, great as my content, Indeed, if fuch high-flown expreffion as Shakspeare has put into the mouth of Othello, be at any time juftifiable, it must be on fuch an occafion as this. The claffical reader may obferve, that the latter part of this fpeech is very like a paffage in the Eunuch of Terence, where Chærea, in a tranfport of delight, breaks out into the following exclamation: Proh Jupiter! Nunc tempus profectò eft, cum perpeti me poffum interfici, Ne hoc gaudium contaminet vita ægritudine aliquâ. A& 3. Sc. 5. Now is the time that I could gladly yield to death, Left life with fome affliction fhould pollute My heart's content. Caffio. : Drunkenness. Do not think, gentlemen, I am drunk this is my ancient: this is my right hand, and this is my left hand: I am not drunk now: I can ftand well enough, and speak well enough. What a fine picture is here exhibited of the drunken man in his comparatively harmless ftate, the commencement of intoxication! How finely too is the progrefs marked to quarrelsomeness, contention, rage, and ruin, when Caffio, ftopped by Montano while pursuing Roderigo, furiously fays, Let me go, fir, neral, for this breach of difcipline, able! Iago. What, are you hurt, lieutenant ? Caffio. Reputation! reputation! repu have loft the immortel part, fir, of mytation! O, I have loft my reputation! I felf, and what remains is beftial. My reputation, Iago, my reputation! Iago. As I am an honeft man, I thought you had received fome bodily wound: there is more offence in that than in reputation, &c. Cafio. I had rather fue to be defpifed, with fo flight, fo drunken, and fo indifthan to deceive fo good a commander, creet an officer. Drunk? and fpeak parrot? and fquabble? fwagger? fwear? and difcourfe fuftian with one's own fhadow? O thou invifible fpirit of wine, if thou haft no name to be known by; let us call thee--devil. Iago. What was he that you followed with your fword? What had he done to you? put an enemy in their mouths, to fteal their brains! that we fhould, with joy, revel, pleafure, and applaufe, tranf away form ourselves into beafts! Iago. Why, but you are now well enough: how came you thus recovered? Caffio. It hath pleafed the devil, drunkennefs, to give place to the devil, wrath: this imperfectnefs fhews me another to make me frankly despise myself. ** I will afk him for my place again; he fhall tell me, I am a drunkard! Had I as many mouths as Hydra, fuch an answer would stop them all. To be now a fenfible man, by and by a fool, and presently a beaft! Orange! Every inordinate cup is unblefs'd, and the ingredient is a devil. A fcene, like this, exhibits a more inftructive leffon againft drunkenness than the most laboured differtations, or the most studied harangues. It is very common that events arife from a debauch which are fatal, and always fuch as are disagreeable. With all a man's reafon and good fenfe about him, his tongue is apt to utter things, out of mere gaiety of heart, which may displease his best friends. Who then would truft himself to the power of wine, to fay no more against it than it raises the imagination, and depreffes the judgment? Were there only this fingle confideration, that we are lefs mafters of ourselves, when we drink in the leaft proportion above the exigencies of thirft, it would be fufficient to make us abhor this vice. But as he who drinks but a little is not master of himself, he who drinks much is, to all intents and purposes, a flave to himself. It has been obferved, (and the obfervation must be productive of the moft awful reflections) that of all vicious perfons a drunkard is the most vicious: for, if our actions are to be judged according to the intention of them, what are we to think of him, who puts himself into a circumftance wherein he can have no intention at all, but incapacitates himself for the duties of life, by a fufpenfion of all his faculties? If a man confiders, that he cannot, while under the oppreffion of liquor, be a friend, a gentleman, a mafter, or a fubject; that he has, for the time that he is under this oppreffion, exiled himself from all that is dear, and abandoned all that is facred to him; he would, even then, think of a debauch with horror. But when he look farther ftill, and acknowledges, that he is not only expelled out of all the relations of life, but also liable to offend against them all, what words he would have of such a condition? can exprefs the terror and deteftation And yet he confeffes all this of himfelf, who fays, I was drunk laft night.' A Hufband's rapturous Exclamation. Excellent wretch! Perdition catch my foul, But I do love thee! and when I love thee not, Chaos is come again. An excellent writer, after quoting the obfervation of a preceding author, that the most extravagant love is nearest to the ftrongeft hatred,' adds: The Moor is furious in both these extremes. His love is tempeftuous, and mingled with a wildness peculiar to his character, which seems very artfully to prepare for the change that is to follow.-How favage, yet how ardent is that expreffion of the raptures of his heart, when looking after Defdemona, as fhe withdraws, he breaks out, Excellent wretch' &c.* The meaning of the word wretch is not generally understood. It is now, in fome parts of England, a term of the fofteft and fondeft tenderness. This is not the only instance in which words, in their prefent general acceptation, bear a very oppofite meaning to what they did in Shakspeare's time. The word wench, formerly, was not used in the low and vulgar acceptation it is at prefent. Damjel was the appellation of young ladies of quality, and dame a title of dif *Guardian, No. 37. tinction. On the Comparative Merits of a MARRIED and a SINGle Life. WH HETHER a married or a fingle life is better calculated to produce felicity, is a confideration which, with much propriety, has long continued, to enter into the deliberations of the reflecting part of mankind, in whatever rank or fituation of life they may chance to be placed; and the decisions of individuals have still continued, and ever will continue, to be various and contradictory, according as the infatuations of paffion and prejudice prevail, or as the application of circumfcribed obfervation, and individual experience, are permitted to influence the general conclufion. Mathematicus, who almoft from his earlieft childhood, displayed an invincible_thirst for science, and an infatuated attachment to literary converfation, in the warmth of youthful gaiety, made fome inconfiderate advances to the blooming Thalia, whofe beautiful perfon commanded the univerfal admiration of beaux and flatterers; and whofe gay and thoughtlefs mind could form no idea of enjoyment, beyond the attentions and amufements of the fashionable circle, nor afpire to any fpecies of cultivation or improvement, but what might be fought in the polite accomplishments of dancing, filigree, and mufic. As the addreffes, however, of a man of letters, when he alfo happens (which, by the way, is not often the cafe) to be a man of lively converfation, feldom fail of being highly acceptable, the advances of Mathematicus met with a very flattering reception; and he found himself en gaged too far for honour to recede, before he had time to confider the probable confequence of a union with fuch a female. In the course of a few months after his nuptials, he confequently discovered that langour and fatiety were the intrufive handmaids of the hymeneal couch, before whose envious breath the roses of beauty faded from the cheek of a partner, who could neither efteem as they deferved the merits of his ferious purfuits, nor fhare with him the pleafures to which his mind was attached with unalterable partiality. Mathematicus, therefore, never Fails to decry the pretended enjoyments of a married life, and to demonftrate, by fyllogifm and logical deduction, the fuperiority and advantages of the fingle ftate; while Amintas, whose foul is enraptured by the complacent charms, congenial temper, and fympathetic tafte of Melinda, enthufiaftically infifts on the beatific raptures and ferene delights of a state, in which confenting hearts blend in harmonious union, and fenfe and virtue mutually confpire to heighten the generous tranfports each bestows. Nor is it always the cafe that the experience of the husband inclines him to depreciate, and the expectations of the unmarried, induce them to exalt the felicity of the matrimonial union; for the example and arguments of Mathematicus have deterred feveral from contracting the indiffoluble obligation, inftead of inveftigating the caufe of his evident infelicity; while Lovemore, after the experience experience of eight years, expreffes himself in language, though lefs enthufiaftic, not lefs decifive, than Amintas-fcrupling not to declare, that when he reviews the whole of his matrimonial life, and feparates from that period of time all that has been devoted to the duties, and the enjoyments of the conjugal ftate, he difcovers not a fingle hour which he would not prefer to the happieft he ever paffed in the boafted reign of unincumbered liberty. Nor are the hopes of the lover lefs encouraged by the example of the cheerful and benevolent father of his intended bride, the whole of whofe deportment and converfation, as he fits in the midft of his numerous and affectionate family, emphatically pronounces, that though the guardianship and education of the dear pledges of his love, and a folicitous attention to the defires and happiness of a fickly, but endearing partner, have given him fome anxieties, and rendered fome exertions neceffary, which, in the cheerless folitude of celibacy, he might certainly have avoided; yet that there are pleasures which counterbalance thofe cares, and hours of tenderness and confolation by which those labours are compenfated with ample intereit. For my own part, I profefs myself to be a mere fpeculatift in this respect, having neither made competent obfervation, nor had perfonal experience of fufficient duration to form a fatisfactory decifion, if calculation, and matter of fact are to be arbiters of the caufe. I have, however, fpeculated too much not to have formed an opinion; and have too much love for the fex, and for my species, not to obey the impulfe which prompts me publicly to pronounce in favour of perpetuating the latter, in a manner most conducive to the felicity, every feeling mind muft rejoice to fee the former enjoy. Nor can I fupprefs the fentiment, that it would be highly injurious to every idea of the wildom and goodnefs of providence, to fuppofe that an infiitution which The only doubt then is, whether it be better to encounter the difficulties and folicitudes, which, by the bulk of mankind, must be expected, as part of the dowry of the moft beloved and amiable bride, and which, at times, muft disturb the enjoyments of the most happy parent, or whether, wrapped in the boafted fecurity of unfeeling selfishness, to feize the clandeftine enjoyments of brutal fenfuality, careless alike of the partner and of the probable confequences of our ungenerous gratifications ? Tell me, ye happy mortals! to whom the power of fympathy is not unknown! whofe hearts have thrilled refponfive to its fine vibrations! Which are the feelings moft to be envied, or defired ?-Thofe of the anxious father of a race whom he has reared and inftructed, perhaps to adorn, at least to benefit fociety, or of the unincumbered libertine, whofe heart, when its gay intemperance fhall fubfide, has no tender object to which it can cling, and who may, perhaps, fometimes reflect, that in all probability he has given being to an unknown race, born to be the pefts of fociety, and the inevitable heirs of wretchedness and infamy? Nature at once decides, the unerring voice of Nature, who (in the beautiful language of Montefquieu) like an indulgent parent, ftrews pleafure and duty in the fame level path.' Nor fhould we too haftily decide against applying this fentiment, even in thofe intances whofe complaint and diffatisfaction moft frequently af |