per ornaments of virtuous and commendable qualities. By this help alone it is, that those who are the favourite work of nature, or as Mr. DRYDEN expresses it, the porcelain clay of human kind, become animated, and are in a capacity of exerting their charms: and those who seem to have been neglected by her, like models wrought in haste, are capable in a great measure of finishing what she has left imperfect.

It is, methinks, a low and degrading idea of that sex, which was created to refine the joys, and soften the cares of humanity, by the most agreeable participation, to consider them merely as objects of sight.---This is abridging them of their natural extent of power, to put them upon a level with their pictures at KNELLER'S. How much nobler is the contemplation of beauty, heightened by virtue, and commanding our esteem and love, while it draws our observation ? How faint and

spiritless are the charms of a coquette, when compared with the real loveliness of SOPHRONIA's innocence, piety, good-humour, and truth; virtues which add a new softness to her sex, and even beautify her beauty! That agreeableness, which must otherwise have appeared no longer in the modest virgin, is now preserved in the tender mother, the prudent friend, and the faithful wife. Colours artfully spread upon canvass may entertain the eye, but not affect the heart; and she who takes no care to add to the natural graces of her person any excelling qualities, may be allowed still to amuse, as a picture; but not to triumph, as a beauty.

When ADAM is introduced by MILTON, describing EVE in Paradise, and relating to the Angel the impressions he felt upon seeing her at her first creation, he does not represent her like a Grecian VENUS, by her shape or features; but by the lustre of her mind, which shone in them, and gave them their power of charming.

"Grace was in all her steps, Heav'n in her eye, "In all her gestures, dignity and love!"

Without this irradiating power, the proudest fair one ought to know, whatever her glass may tell her to the contrary, that her most perfect features are unin formed and dead.

'I cannot better close this moral, than by a short epitaph written by BEN JONSON, with a spirit which nothing could inspire but such an object as I have been describing:

"Underneath this stone doth lie
"As much virtue as could die;
"Which when alive did vigour give
"To as much beauty as could live."

"From spotted skins the leopard does refrain."

TATE.

MEMBERS OF THE CLUB DESIRE AN EXEMPTION, EACH FOR HIS OWN CLASS, FROM THE SPECTATOR'S ANIMADVERSIONS

OVERRULed.

THE club of which I am a member, is very luckily composed of such persons as are engaged in different ways of life, and deputed as it were out of the most conspicuous classes of mankind. By these means I am

furnished with the greatest variety of hints and materials, and know every thing that passes in the different quarters and divisions, not only of this great city, but of the whole kingdom. My readers too have the satisfaction to find, that there is no rank or degree among them who have not their representative in this club, and that there is always somebody present who will take care of their respective interests, that nothing may be written or published to the prejudice or infringement of their just rights and privileges.

I last night sat very late in company with this select body of friends, who entertained me with several remarks which they and others had made upon these my speculations, as also with the various success which they had met with among their several ranks and degrees of readers. WILL HONEYCOMB told me, in the softest manner he could, That there were some ladies (but for your comfort, says WILL, they are not those of the most wit) that were offended at the liberties I had taken with the opera and the puppet-show; that some of them were likewise very much surprised, that I should think such serious points as the dress and equipage of persons of quality, proper subjects for raillery.

He was going on, when Sir ANDREW FREEPORT took him up short, and told him, That the papers he hinted at, had done great good in the city, and that all their wives and daughters were the better for them; and further added, that the whole city thought themselves very much obliged to me for declaring my generous intentions to scourge vice and folly as they appear in a multitude, without condescending to be a publisher of particular intrigues and cuckoldoms. In short, says Sir ANDREW, if you avoid that foolish beaten road of falling upon aldermen and citizens, and employ your pen upon the vanity and luxury of courts, your paper must needs be of general use.

Upon this my friend the TEMPLAR told Sir ANDRew, That he wondered to hear a man of his sense talk after

that

that manner; that the city had always been the province for satire; and that the wits of King CHARLES's time jested upon nothing else during his whole reign. He then shewed, by the examples of HORACE, JUVENAL, BOILEAU, and the best writers of every age, that the follies of the stage and court had never been accounted too sacred for ridicule, how great soever the persons might be that patronized them. But after all, says he, I think your raillery has made too great an excursion, in attacking several persons of the inns of court; and I do not believe you can shew me any precedent for your behaviour in that particular.

My good friend Sir ROGER DE COVERLEY, who had said nothing all this while, began his speech with a pish! and told us, That he wondered to see so many men of sense so very serious upon fooleries. Let our good friend, says he, attack every one that deserves it: I would only advise you, Mr. SPECTATOR, applying himself to me, to take care how you meddle with countrysquires. They are the ornaments of the English nation; men of good heads, and sound bodies! and, let me tell you, some of them take it ill of you, that you mention fox-hunters with so little respect.

Captain SENTRY spoke very sparingly on this occasion. What he said was only to commend my prudence in not touching upon the army, and advised me to continue to act discreetly in that point.

By this time I found every subject of my speculations was taken away from me, by one or other of the club; and began to think myself in the condition of the good man that had one wife who took a dislike to his grey hairs, and another to his black, till by their picking out what each of them had an aversion to, they left his head altogether bald and naked.

While I was thus musing with myself, my worthy friend the CLERGYMAN, who, very luckily for me, was at the club that night, undertook my cause. He told us, That he wondered any order of persons should think themselves

too considerable to be advised. That it was not quality, but innocence, which exempted men from reproof.That vice and folly ought to be attacked wherever they could be met with, and especially when they were. placed in high and conspicuous stations of life. He further added, that my paper would only serve to aggravate the pains of poverty, if it chiefly exposed those who are already depressed, and in some measure turned into ridicule, by the meanness of their conditions and circumstances. He afterward proceeded to take notice of the great use this paper might be of to the public, by reprehending those vices which are too trivial for the chastisement of the law, and too fantastical for the cognizance of the pulpit. He then advised me to prosecute my undertaking with chearfulness, and assured me, that whoever might be displeased with me, I should be approved by all those whose praises do honour to persons on whom they are bestowed.

The whole club pays a particular deference to the discourse of this gentleman, and are drawn into what he says, as much by the candid ingenuous manner with which he delivers himself, as by the strength of argument and force of reason which he makes use of. WILL HONEYCOMB immediately agreed, that what he had said. was right; and that for his part, he would not insist upon the quarter which he had demanded for the ladies. Sir ANDREW gave up the city with the same frankness. The TEMPLAR Would not stand out, and was followed by Sir ROGER and the CAPTAIN: who all agreed that I should be at liberty to carry the war into what quarter I pleased, provided I continued to combat with criminals in body, and to assault the vice without hurting the person.

This debate, which was held for the good of mankind, put me in mind of that which the Roman Triumvirate were formerly engaged in, for their destruction. Every man at first stood hard for his friend, till they found that by these means they should spoil their proscription; and at length,