Mifs Kitty muft excuse me. The gentleman who fent me a copy of verses on his mistress's dancing, is, I believe, too thoroughly in love to compofe correctly. I have too great a refpect for both the univerfities to praise one at the expence of the other. Tom Nimble is a very honeft fellow, and I defire him to present my humble fervice to his coufin Fill Bumper. I am obliged for the letter upon prejudice. I may in due time animadvert on the cafe of Grace Grumble. The petition of P. S. granted. I thank Ariftippus for his kind invitation. My friend at Woodstock is a bold man, to undertake for all within ten miles of him. I am afraid the entertainment of Tom Turnover will hardly be relished by the good cities of London and Westminster. I muft confider farther of it, before I indulge W. F. in those freedoms he takes with the Ladies ftockings. I am obliged to the ingenious gentleman, who fent me an ode on the fubject of the late SPECTATOR, and shall take particular notice of his last letter. When the Lady who wrote me a letter, dated July the 20th, in relation to fome paffages in a Lover, will be more particular in her directions, I fhall be fo in my answer. The poor gentleman, who fancies my writings could reclaim an husband who can abuse such a wife as he defcribes, has, I am afraid, too great an opinion of my skill. Philanthropos is, I dare fay, a very well-meaning man, but a little too prolix in his compofitions. Conftantius Conftantius himself must be the best judge in the affair he mentions. The letter dated from Lincoln is received. me. Arethuja and her friend may hear farther from Celia is a little too hafty. Harriot is a good girl, but must not courtfey to folks fhe does not know. I must ingenioufly confefs, my friend Sampson Bentftaff has quite puzzled me, and writ me a long letter which I cannot comprehend one word of. Collidan must also explain what he means by his Drigelling. I think it beneath my Spectatorial dignity, to concern myself in the affair of the boiled dumpling. I fhall confult fome Litterati on the project fent me for the difcovery of the longitude. I know not how to conclude this paper better, than by inferting a couple of letters which are really genuine, and which I look upon to be two of the fmarteft pieces I have received from my correfpondents of either fex. Brother SPEC, WHILE you are furveying every object that falls in your way, I am wholly taken up with one. Had that fage, who demanded what beauty was, lived to fee the dear angel I love, he would not have asked fuch a queftion. Had another feen her, he would himself have loved the perfon in whom heaven has made virtue vifible; and were you yourfelf to be in her company, you would never, with all your loquacity, fay enough of her good-humour and fenfe. I fend you the outlines of a picture, which I can no more ⚫ finish than I can fufficiently admire the dear original. I am Your most affectionate brother, I Good Mr. PERT, WILL allow you nothing until you refolve me the following question. Pray what is the reafon that while you only talk now upon Wednefdays, Fridays, and Mondays, you pretend to be a greater tatler than when you fpoke every day, as you formerly used to do? If this be your plunging out of your taciturnity, pray let the length of your fpeeches compenfate for the fcarce-• ness of them. I am, "Good Mr. PERT, Your admirer, if you will be long enough for me, AMANDA LOVELENGTH. N°582. WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 18. Tenet infanabile multos » Scribendi Caceethes Juv. Sat. vii. ver. 51. The curfe of writing is an endless itch. CH. DRYDEN.. : THERE HERE is a certain diftemper, which is mentioned neither by Galen nor Hippocrates, nor to be met with in the London Difpenfatory.. Juvenal, in the motto of my paper, terms it a Gacoethes; which: is a hard word for a difeafe called in plain English, The itch of writing. This Gacoethes is as epidemical as the fmall pox, there being very few who are not feized with it fome time or other in their lives. There is, however, this difference in these two diftempers, that the firft, after having indifpofed you for a time, never returns again; whereas this I am speaking of, when it is once got into the blood, feldom comes out of it. The British nation is very much afflicted with this malady, and though very 117 very many remedies have been applied to persons infected with it, few of them have ever proved fuccefsful. Some have been cauterized with fatires and lampoons, but have received little or no benefit from them; others have had their heads fastened for an hour together between a cleft board, which is made ufe of as a cure for the difeafe when it appears in its greatest malignity. There is indeed one kind of this malady which has been sometimes removed like the biting of a Tarantula, with the found of a mufical inftrument, which is commonly known by the name of a Cat-call. But if you have a patient of this kind under your care, you may affure yourself there is no other way of recovering him effectually, but by forbidding him the use of pen, ink, and paper. But to drop the allegory before I have tired it out, there is no fpecies of fcribblers more offenfive and more incurable than your periodical writers, whofe works return upon the publick on certain days, and at ftated times. We have not the confo lation, in the perufal of thefe authors, which we find at the reading of all others, (namely) that we are fure, if we have but patience, we may come to the end of their labours. I have often admired an humourous faying of Diogenes, who reading a dull author to feveral of his friends, when every one began to be tired, finding he was almoft come to a blank leaf at the end of it, cried, Courage lads, I fee land. On the contrary, our progrefs through that kind of writers I am now fpeaking of is never at an end. One day makes work for another, we do not know when to promife ourselves reft. It is a melancholy thing to confider, that the art of printing, which might be the greatest bleffing to mankind, thould prove detrimental to us, and that it fhould be made ufe of to fcatter prejudice and ignorance through a people, inftead of conveying to them truth and knowledge. I was lately reading a very whimsical treatise, intitled, William Ramjay's Vindication of Aftrology. This profound author, among many myftical paffages, has the following one: The abfence of the fun is not the caufe of night, forafinuch as his light is fo great that it may illuminate the earth all over at once, as clear as broad day; but there are tenebrificous and dark stars, by whofe influence night is brought on, and which do ray all our darkness and obfcurity upon the earth, as the ⚫ fun does light. I confider writers in the fame view this fage a-ftrologer does the heavenly bodies. Some of them. are ftars that featter light as others do darkness. I could mention feveral authors who are tenebrificous ftars of the first magnitude, and point out a knot of gentlemen, who have been dull in confort, and may be looked upon as a dark conftellation. The nation has been a great while benighted with feveRal of thefe antiluminaries. I fuffered them to. ray out their darkness as long as I was able to en-dure it, until at length I came to a refolution of rifing upon them, and hope, in a little time, to drive them quite out of the British hemis fphere. FRIDAY, |