No. 101. TUESDAY, JUNE 26. Romulus, et Liber pater, et cum Caflore Pollux, HOR. Ep. I. 1. ii. ver. 5. IMITATED. Edward and Henry, now the boast of fame, POPE. ENSURE, fays a late ingenious author, is the tax a man pays to the publick for being eminent. It is a folly for an eminent man to think of efcaping it, and a weakness to be affected with it. All the illuftrious perfons of antiquity, and indeed of every age in the world, have paffed through this fiery perfecution. There is no defence against reproach but obfcurity; it is a kind of concomitant to greatnefs, as fatires and invectives were an effential part of a Roman triumph. If men of eminence are expofed to cenfure on one hand, they are as much liable to flattery on the other. If they receive reproaches which are not due to them, they likewife receive praises which they do not deserve. In a word, the man in a high poft is never regarded with an indifferent eye, but always confidered as a friend or an enemy. For this reafon perfons in great ftations have feldom their true characters drawn till feveral years after their deaths. Their perfonal friendships and enmities must ceafe, and the parties they were engaged in be at an end, before their faults or their vir tues can have juftice done them. When writers have the leaft opportunities of knowing the truth, they are in the beft difpofition to tell it. It is therefore the privilege of pofterity to adjust the characters of illuftrious perfons, and to fet matters right between thofe antagonifts, who by their rivalry for greatnefs divided a whole age into factions. We can now allow Cafar to be a great man, without derogating from Pompey; and celebrate the virtues of Cato, without detracting from thofe of Cafar. Every one that has been long dead has a due proportion of praife allotted him, in which, whilst he lived, his friends were too profuse and his enemies too sparing. According to Sir Ifaac Newton's calculations, the laft comet that made its appearance in 1680, imbibed fo much heat by its approaches to the fun, that it would have been two thousand times hotter than red hot iron, had it been a globe of that metal; and that, fuppofing it as big as the earth, and at the fame distance from the fun, it would be fifty thousand years in cooling, before it recovered its natural temper. In the like manner, if an Englishman confiders the great ferment into which our political world is thrown at prefent, and how intenfely it is heated in all its parts, he cannot fuppofe that it will cool again in less than three hundred years. In fuch a tract of time it is poffible that the heats of the prefent age may be extinguifhed, and our feveral claffes of great men reprefented under their proper characters. Some eminent hiftorian may then probably arife, that will not write recentibus odiis (as Tacitus expreffes it) with the paffions and prejudices of a cotemporary author, but H 2 make make an impartial diftribution of fame among the great men of the prefent age. I cannot forbear entertaining myself very often with the idea of fuch an imaginary hiftorian defcribing the reign of ANNE the Firft, and introducing it with a preface to his reader, that he is now entering upon the moft fhining part of the English ftory. The great rivals in fame will be then diftinguifhed according to their refpective merits, and thine in their proper points of light. Such an one (fays the hiftorian) though variously reprefented by the writers of his own age, appears to have been a man of more than ordinary abilities, great application, and uncommon integrity: Nor was fuch an one (though of an oppofite party and intereft) inferior to him in any of these refpects. The feveral antagonists who now endeavour to depreciate one another, and are celebrated or traduced by different parties, will then have the fame body of admirers, and appear illuftrious in the opinion of the whole British nation. The deferving man, who can now recommend himself to the efteem of but half his countrymen, will then receive the approbations and applaufes of a whole age. Among the feveral perfons that flourish in this glorious reign, there is no queftion but such a future hiftorian, as the perfon of whom I am fpeaking, will make mention of the men of genius and learning, who have now any figure in the British nation. For my own part, I often flatter myself with the honourable mention which will then be made of me; and have drawn up a paragraph in my own imagination, that I fancy will not be altogether unlike what will be found in some page or other of this imaginary hiftorian. It was under this reign, fays he, that the SPECTATOR published thofe little diurnal effays which are ftill extant. We know very little of the name or person of this author, except only that he was a man man of a very fhort face, extremely addicted to filence, and fo great a lover of knowledge, that he made a voyage to Grand Cairo for no other reason, but to take the measure of a pyramid. His chief friend was one Sir ROGER DE COVERLEY, a whimfical country knight, and a Templar, whofe name he has not tranfmitted to us. He lived as a lodger at the house of a widow woman, and was a great humorist in all parts of his life. This is all we can affirm with any certainty of his perfon and character. As for his fpeculations, notwithstanding the feveral obfolete words and obfcure phrases of the age in which he lived, we ftill understand enough of them to fee the diverfions and characters of the English nation in his time: Not but that we are to make allowance for the mirth and humour of the author, who has doubtless strained many representations of things beyond the truth. For if we interpret his words in their literal meaning, we must suppose that women of the first quality used to pass away whole mornings at a puppetfhow: That they attested their principals by their patches: That au audience would fit out an evening to hear a dramatical performance written in a language they did not understand: That chairs and flower-pots were introduced as actors upon the British stage: That a promifcuous affembly of men and women were allowed to meet at midnight in masks, within the verge of the court; with many improbabilities of the like nature. We must therefore, in thefe and the like cafes, fuppose that these remote hints and allufions aimed at fome certain follies which were then in vogue, and which at prefent we have not any notion of. We may guefs by feveral paffages in the Speculations, that there were writers who endeavoured to detract from the works of this author; but as nothing of this nature is come down to us, we cannot guefs at any objections that could be made to his paper. If we confider his ftile with H 3 that that indulgence which we muft fhew to old Englif writers, or if we look into the variety of his fubjects, with these feveral critical differtations, moral reflections, * The following part of the paragraph is fo much to my advantage, and beyond any thing I can pretend to, that I hope my reader will excufe me for not inferting it. No. 102. I WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27. Lufus animo debent aliquando dari, Ad cogitandum melior ut redeat sibi. PHED. Fab. xiv. l. 3. The mind ought fometimes to be diverted, that it may return the better to thinking. Do not know whether to call the following letter a fatire upon coquettes, or a reprefentation of their feveral fantaftical accomplithments, or what other title to give it; but as it is I fhall communicate it to the publick. It will fufficiently explain its own intention, fo that I fhall give it to my reader at length, without either preface or postfcript. Mr SPECTATOR, WOMEN are armed with fans as men with fwords, and fometimes do more execution with 'them. To the end therefore that ladies may be intire miftreffes of the weapon which they bear, I have erected an academy for the training up of young women in the Exercife of the Fan, accord |