Obrázky stránek
PDF
ePub

of health, age, fortune, or any of those accidents which are apt to unsettle the best dispositions that are founded rather in constitution than in reason. Where such a constancy as this is wanting, the most inflamed passion may fall away into coldness and indifference, and the most melting tenderness degenerate into hatred and aversion. I shall conclude this paper with a story that is very well known in the north of England.

About thirty years ago, a packet-boat that had several passengers on board was cast away upon a rock, and in so great danger of sinking, that all who were in it endeavoured to save themselves as well as they could, though only those who could swim well had a bare possibility of doing it. Among the passengers there were two women of fashion, who seeing themselves in such a disconsolate condition, begged of their husbands not to leave them. One of them chose rather to die with his wife, than to forsake her; the other, though he was moved with utmost compassion for his wife, told her, that for the good of their children it was better one of them should live, than both perish. By a great piece of good luck, next to a miracle, when one of our good men had taken the last and long farewell in order to save himself, and the other held in his arms the person that was dearer to him than life, the ship was preserved. It is with a secret sorrow and vexation of mind that I must tell the sequel of the story, and let my reader know, that this faithful pair who were ready to have died in each other's arms, about three years after their escape, upon some trifling disgust, grew to a coldness at first, and at length fell out to such a degree, that they left one another, and parted for ever. The other couple lived together in an uninterrupted friendship and felicity; and, what was remarkable, the husband whom the shipwreck had like to have separated from his wife, died a few months after her, not being able to survive the loss of her.

I must confess, there is something in the changeableness and inconstancy of human nature, that very often both dejects and terrifies me. Whatever I am at present, I tremble to think what I may be. While I find this principle in me, how can I assure myself, that I shall be always true to my God, my friend, or myself? in short, without constancy there is neither love, friendship, or virtue in the world.

AMBITION

No. 202.] TUESDAY, JULY 25, 1710. [STEELE.]

Est hic,

Est Ulubris, animus si te non deficit æquus.

True happiness is to no spot confin'd:
If you preserve a firm and equal mind,
'Tis here, 'tis there, and every where.

HOR. I Ep. xi.

HIS afternoon I went to visit a gentleman of my acquaintance

could not forbear entertaining myself with the inscriptions on the tombs and graves. Among others, I observed one with this notable memorial:

"HERE LIES THE BODY OF T. B."

This fanatical desire, of being remembered only by the two first letters of a name, led me into the contemplation of the vanity and imperfect attainments of ambition in general. When I run back in my imagination all the men whom I have ever known and conversed with in my whole life, there are but very few who have not used their faculties in the pursuit of what it is impossible to acquire; or left the possession of what they might have been, at their setting out, masters, to search for it where it was out of their reach. In this thought it was not possible to forget the instance of Pyrrhus, who proposing to himself in discourse with a philosopher, one, and another, and another conquest, was asked, what he would after all that? "Then," says the king, "we will make merry." He was well answered, "What hinders you doing that in the condition you are already?" The restless desire of exerting themselves above the common level of mankind is not to be resisted in some tempers; and minds of this make may be observed in every condition of life. Where such men do not make to themselves, or meet with employment, the soil of their constitution runs into tares and weeds. An old friend of mine, who lost a major's post forty years ago, and quitted, has ever since studied maps, encampments, retreats, and counter-marches; with no other design but to feed his spleen and ill-humour, and furnish himself with matter for arguing against all the successful actions of others. He that, at his first setting out in

the world, was the gayest man in our regiment; ventured his life with alacrity, and enjoyed it with satisfaction; encouraged men below him, and was courted by men above him, has been ever since the most froward creature breathing. His warm complexion spends itself now only in a general spirit of contradiction; for which he watches all occasions, and is in his conversation still upon centry, treats all men like enemies, with every other impertinence of a speculative warrior.

He, that observes in himself this natural inquietude, should take all imaginable care to put his mind in some method of gratification; or he will soon find himself grow into the condition of this disappointed major. Instead of courting proper .occasions to rise above others, he will be ever studious of pulling others down to him: it being the common refuge of disappointed ambition, to ease themselves by detraction. It would be no great argument against ambition, that there are such mortal things in the disappointment of it; but it certainly is a forcible exception, that there can be no solid happiness in the success of it. If we value popular praise, it is in the power of the meanest of the people to disturb us by calumny. If the fame of being happy, we cannot look into a village, but we see crowds in actual possession of what we seek only the appearance. To this may be added, that there is I know not what malignity in the minds of ordinary men, to oppose you in what they see you fond of; and it is a certain exception against a man's receiving applause, that he visibly courts it. However, this is not only the passion of great and undertaking spirits; but you see it in the lives of such as, one would believe, were far enough removed from the ways of ambition. The rural esquires of this nation even eat and drink out of vanity. A vain-glorious fox-hunter shall entertain half a county, for the ostentation of his beef and beer, without the least affection for any of the crowd about him. He feeds them, because he thinks it a superiority over them that he does so; and they devour him, because they know he treats them out of insolence. This indeed is ambition in grotesque; but may figure to us the condition of politer men, whose only pursuit is glory. When the superior acts out of a principle of vanity, the dependent will be sure to allow it him; because he knows it destructive of the very applause which is courted by the man who favours him, and consequently makes him nearer himself.

But as every man living has more or less of this incentive, which

makes men impatient of an inactive condition, and urges men to attempt what may tend to their reputation; it is absolutely necessary they should form to themselves an ambition, which is in every man's power to gratify. This ambition would be independent, and would consist only in acting what, to a man's own mind, appears most great and laudable. It is a pursuit in the power of every man, and is only a regular prosecution of what he himself approves. It is what can be interrupted by no outward accidents; for no man can be robbed of his good intention. One of our society of the Trumpet therefore started last night a notion, which I thought had reason in it. "It is, methinks," said he, "an unreasonable thing, that honest virtue should, as it seems to be at present, be confined to a certain order of men, and be attainable by none but those whom fortune has elevated to the most conspicuous stations. I would have everything to be esteemed as heroic, which is great and uncommon in the circumstances of the man who performs it." Thus there would be no virtue in human life, which every one of the species would not have a pretence to arrive at, and an ardency to exert. Since fortune is not in our power, let us be as little as possible in hers. Why should it be necessary that a man should be rich, to be generous? If we measured by the quality and not the quantity of things, the particulars which accompany an action is what should denominate it mean or great. The highest station of human life is to be attained by each man that pretends to it: for any man can be as valiant, as generous, as wise, and as merciful, as the faculties and opportunities which he has from heaven and fortune will permit. He that can say to himself, “I do as much good, and am as virtuous as my most earnest endeavours will allow me," whatever is his station in the world, is to himself possessed of the highest honour. If ambition is not thus turned, it is no other than a continual succession of anxiety and vexation. But when it has this cast, it invigorates the mind; and the consciousness of its own worth is a reward, which is not in the power of envy, reproach, or detraction, to take from it. Thus the seat of solid honour is in a man's own bosom: and no one can want support who is in possession of an honest conscience, but he who would suffer the reproaches of it for other greatness.

FLATTERY AS AN ART

No. 208.] TUESDAY, AUGUST 8, 1710. [STEELE.]

Si dixeris æstuo, sudat.

Juv. Sat. iii. 103.

-If you complain of heat,

They rub th' unsweating brow, and swear they sweat.

N old acquaintance, who met me this morning, seemed over

me do these forty years; "but," continued he, "not quite the man you were, when we visited together at lady Brightly's. Oh! Isaac, those days are over. Do you think there are any such fine creatures now living, as we then conversed with?" He went on with a thousand incoherent circumstances, which, in his imagination, must needs please me; but they had the quite contrary effect. The flattery with which he began, in telling me how well I wore, was not disagreeable; but his indiscreet mention of a set of acquaintance we had outlived, recalled ten thousand things to my memory, which made me reflect upon my present condition with regret. Had he indeed been so kind as, after a long absence, to felicitate me upon an indolent and easy old age; and mentioned how much he and I had to thank for, who at our time of day could walk firmly, eat heartily, and converse cheerfully, he had kept up my pleasure in myself. But of all mankind, there are none so shocking as these injudicious civil people. They ordinarily begin upon something, that they know must be a satisfaction; but then, for fear of the imputation of flattery, they follow it with the last thing in the world of which you would be reminded. It is this that perplexes civil persons. The reason that there is such a general outcry among us against flatterers is, that there are so very few good ones. It is the nicest art in this life, and is a part of eloquence which does not want the preparation that is necessary to all other parts of it, that your audience should be your well-wishers: for praise from an enemy is the most pleasing of all commendations.

[ocr errors]

It is generally to be observed, that the person most agreeable to a man for a constancy is he that has no shining qualities, but is a certain degree above great imperfections; whom he can live with as his inferior, and who will either overlook, or not observe his little de

« PředchozíPokračovat »