When young and tir'd with sport and play, CREECH. I have heard that the late Lord Dorset, who had the greatest wit tempered with the greatest candour, and was one of the finest criticks as well as the best poet of his age, had a numerous collection of old English ballads, and took a particular pleasure in the reading of them. I can affirm the fame of Mr Dryden, and know feveral of the most refined writers of our prefent age who are of the fame humour. I might likewife refer my reader to Moliere's thoughts on this fubject, as he has expreffed them in the character of the Mifanthrope; but those only who are endowed with a true greatness of soul and genius can diveft themselves of the little images of ridicule, and admire nature in her fimplicity and nakedness. As for the little conceited wits of the age, who can only fhew their judgment by finding fault, they cannot be supposed to admire these productions which have nothing to recommend them but the beauties of nature, when they do not know how to relish even those compofitions that, with all the beauties of nature, have also the additional advantages of art. No. 86. FRIDAY, JUNE 8. Heu quám difficile eft crimen non prodere vultu! How in the looks does confcious guilt appear! T ADDISON. HERE are several arts which all men are in fome measure masters of, without having been at the pains of learning them. Every one that speaks or reafons is a grammarian and a logician, though he may be wholly unacquainted with the rules of grammar or logick, as they are delivered in books and fyftemns. In the fame manner, every one is in fome degree a mafter of that art which is generally diftinguifhed by the name of phyfiognomy; and naturally forms to himself the character or fortune of a ftranger, from the features and lineaments of his face. We are no fooner prefented to any one we never faw before, but we are immediately ftruck with the idea of a proud, a referved, an affable, or a good-natured man; and upon our first going into a company of strangers, our benevolence or averfion, awe or contempt, rifes naturally towards feveral particular perfons, before we have heard them speak a single word, or so much as know who they are. Every paffion gives a particular caft to the countenance, and is apt to discover itself in fome feature or other. I have feen an eye curfe for half an hour together, and an eye-brow call a man fcoundrel. Nothing is more common than for lovers to complain, refent, languish, despair, and die in dumb how. For my own part, I am fo apt to frame a notion of every man's humour or circumstances by his looks, that I have fometimes employed myself from Charing-Crofs to the Royal-Exchange, in drawing the characters of those who have passed by me. When I see a man with a four rivelled face, I cannot forbear pitying his wife; and when I meet with an open ingenuous countenance, think on the happinefs of his friends, his family, and relations. I cannot recollect the author of a famous faying to a firanger who stood filent in his company, Speak that I may fee thee. But with fubmiffion, I think we may be better known by our looks than by our words, and that a man's fpeech is much more eafily disguised than his countenance. In this cafe, how ever, I think the air of the whole face is much more expreffive than the lines of it: The truth of it is, the air is generally nothing elfe but the inward difpofition of the mind made vifible. Those who have established phyfiognomy into an art, and laid down rules of judging mens tempers by their faces, have regarded the features much more than the air. Martial has a pretty epigram on this fubject: Crine ruber, niger ore, brevis pede, lumine lafus : Epig. liv. 1. 12. I have seen a very ingenious author on this fubject, who founds his fpeculations on the fuppofition, that as a man hath in the mould of his face, a remote likeness to that of an ox, a fheep, a lion, an hog, or any other creature; he hath the fame refemblance in the frame of his mind, and is fubject to those paffions which are predominant in the creature that appears in his countenance. Accordingly he gives the prints of feveral faces that are of a different mould, and by a little overcharging the likeness, discovers the figures of these several kinds of brutal faces in human features. I remember, in the life of the famous prince of Conde, the writer obferves, the face of that prince was like the face of an eagle, and that the prince was very well pleased to be told fo. In this cafe, therefore, we may be fure, that he had in his mind fome general implicit notion of this art of phyfiognomy which I have just now mentioned; and that, when his courtiers told him his face was made like an eagle's, he underfood them in the fame manner as if they had told him, there was fomething in his looks which fhewed fhewed him to be strong, active, piercing, and of a royal defcent. Whether or no the different motions of the animal fpirits, in different paffions, may have any effect on the mould of the face when the lineaments are pliable and tender, or whether the fame kind of fouls require the fame kinds of habitations, I fhall leave to the confideration of the curious. In the mean time I think nothing can be more glorious than for a man to give the lie to his face, and to be an honest, juft, good-natured man, in fpite of all thofe marks and fignatures which nature seems to have fet upon him for the contrary. This very often happens among those, who, instead of being exafperated by their own looks, or envying the looks of others, apply themselves entirely to the cultivating of their minds, and getting those beauties which are more lafting and more orna mental. I have feen many an amiable piece of deformity; and have obferved a certain cheerfulness in as bad a fyftem of features as ever was clapped together, which hath appeared more lovely than all the blooming charms of an infolent beauty. There is a double praife due to virtue, when it is lodged body that seems to have been prepared for the reception of vice; in many fuch cafes the foul and the body do not seem to be fellows. in Socrates was an extraordinary instance of this nature. There chanced to be a great phyfiognomist in his time at Athens, who had made strange difcoveries of mens tempers and inclinations by their outward appearences. Socrates's difciples, that they might put this artift to the tryal, carried him to their mafter, whom he had never feen before, and did not know he was then in company with him. After a fhort examination of his face, the phyfiognomist pronounced him the most lewd, libidinous, drunken old fellow that he had ever met with in his whole life. Upon which the difciples all burst out a laughing, as thinking they had detected the falfehood, But Socrates told falfehood and vanity of his art. them, that the principles of his art might be very true, notwithstanding his present mistake; for that he himself was naturally inclined to those particular vices which the phyfiognomist had discovered in his countenance, but that he had conquered the ftrong difpofitions he was born with by the dictates of philofophy. We are indeed told by an ancient author, that Socrates very much resembled Silenus in his face; which we find to have been very rightly observed from the ftatutes and bufts of both hat are still extant; as well as on feveral antique feals and precious ftones which are frequently enough to be met with in the cabinets of the curious. But, however obfervations of this nature may fometimes hold, a wife man should be particularly cautious how he gives credit to a man's outward appearance. It is an irreparable injuftice we are guilty of towards. one another, when we are prejudiced by the looks and features of thofe whom we do not know. How often do we conceive hatred against a person of worth, or fancy a man to be proud or ill-natured by his afpect, whom we think we cannot esteem too much when we are acquainted with his real character? Dr Moore, in his admirable fyftem of ethicks, reckons this particular inclination to take a preju-. dice against a man for his looks, among the fmaller. vices in morality, and, if I remember, gives it the name of a Profopolepfia. VOL. II. C SATURDAY, |