Nor yet from some was all Distrust remov'd, 'Mr. SPECTATOR, Your very humble Servant, No. 527, 1712. Philagnotes.' You will oblige a languishing Lover, if you will please to print the enclosed Verses in your next Paper. If you remember the Metamorphosis, you know Procrís, the fond Wife of Cephalus, is said to have made her Husband, who delighted in the Sports of the Wood, a Present of an unerring Javelin. In Process of Time he was so much in the Forest, that his Lady suspected he was pursuing some Nymph, under the Pretence of following a Chace more innocent. Under this Suspicion she hid her self among the Trees to observe his Motions. While she lay concealed, her Husband, tired with the Labour of Hunting, came within her Hearing. As he was fainting with Heat, he cryed out, Aura vení: Oh charming Air approach. The unfortunate Wife, taking the Word Air to be the Name of a Woman, began to move among the Bushes, and the Husband believing it a Deer, threw his Javelin and killed her. This History painted on a Fan, which I presented to a Lady, gave occasion to my growing poetical Come gentle Air! th' Eolian Shepherd said, Wednesday Wednes day, Nov. 5. 1712. No. 528, No. 528. Wednesday, November 5. Dum potuit, solita gemitum virtute repressit,—Ovid. 'Mr. SPECTATOR, I 1712. withstanding their Care; nor by that of Romans, for No. 528, they designed to extirpate the Roman Name." Then Wednes proceeding to shew his tender Care and hearty Affection day, Nov. 5, for his People, he further told 'em, "That their Course of Life was of such pernicious Consequence to the Glory and Grandeur of the Roman Nation, that he could not chuse but tell 'em, that all other Crimes put together could not equalize theirs: For they were guilty of Murder, in not suffering those to be born which should proceed from them; of Impiety, in causing the Names and Honours of their Ancestors to cease; and of Sacrilege, in destroying their Kind, which proceed from the Im mortal Gods, and human Nature, the principal Thing consecrated to 'em: Therefore, in this Respect they dis solved the Government, in disobeying its Laws; betrayed their Country, by making it barren and waste; nay, and demolished their City, in depriving it of Inhabitants. And he was sensible that all this proceeded not from any kind of Virtue or Abstinence, but from a Looseness and Wantonness, which ought never to be encourag'd in any Civil Government." There are no Particulars dwelt upon that let us into the Conduct of these young Worthies, whom this great Emperor treated with so much Justice and Indignation; but any one who observes what passes in this Town, may very well frame to himself a Notion of their Riots and Debaucheries all Night, and their apparent Preparations for them all Day. It is not to be doubted but these Romans never passed any of their Time innocently but when they were asleep, and never slept but when they were weary and heavy with Ex cesses, and slept only to prepare themselves for the Repetition of them. If you did your Duty as a SPECTATOR, you would carefully examine into the Number of Births, Marriages, and Burials; and when you had deducted out of your Deaths all such as went out of the World without marrying, then cast up the Number of both Sexes born within such a Term of Years last past, you might from the single People departed make some useful Inferences or Guesses how many there are left unmarried, and raise some useful Scheme for the Amendment of the Age in that particular. I have not Patience to proceed gravely on No. 528, Wednes day, Nov. 5, 1712. on this abominable Libertinism; for I cannot but reflect, now now three and twenty, and have had Proposals from No. 528. at least ten different Men, and the greater Number of Wednes them have upon the Upshot refused me, Something Nov. 5, day, or other is always amiss when the Lover takes to some 1712. new Wench: A Settlement is easily excepted against; and there is very little Recourse to avoid the vitious Part of our Youth, but throwing one's self away upon some lifeless Blockhead, who though he is without Vice, is also without Virtue. Now-a-days we must be contented if we can get Creatures which are not bad; good are not to be expected. Mr. SPECTATOR, I sate near you the other Day, and I think I did not displease your Spectatorial Eye-sight; which I shall be a better Judge of when I see whether you take Notice of these Evils your own way, or print this Memorial dictated from the disdainful heavy Heart of, Sír, Your most Obedient Humble Servant, T No. 529, Thursday, November 6. Singula quaeque locum teneant sortita decenter.-Hor. TPON the hearing of several late Disputes concerning Rank and Precedence, I could not forbear amusing my self with some Observations, which I have made upon the Learned World, as to this great Particular. By the Learned World I here mean at large, all those who are any way concerned in Works of Literature, whether in the Writing, Printing or Repeating Part. To begin with the Writers; I have observed that the Author of a Folio, in all Companies and Conversations, sets himself above the Author of a Quarto; the Author of a Quarto above the Author of an Octavo; and so on, by a gradual Descent and Subordination, to an Author in Twenty-Fours. This Distinction is so well observed, that in an Assembly of the Learned, I have seen a Folio Writer place himself in an Elbow-chair, when the Author of a Duo-decimo has, out of a just Deference to his superior Quality, seated himself upon a Squabb. In a Word, Authors are usually ranged |