Whatever the short-fighted votaries of avarice and ambition may affert, there is no doubt but that real goodness of heart is the nobleft ornament of human nature, and the leaft fallible fource of permanent fatisfaction. I have often therefore lamented, that in the courfe of what is called a liberal education, very little attention has been paid at our best schools to the culture of the heart. While good feeds have been fown in the understanding, the heart has been fuffered to be overrun with weeds and briars. In truth, learning and abilities, without goodness of heart, conftitute that kind of wifdom which is foolishness in the fight of reafon and of God. Without goodnefs of heart, man, however accomplished, is fo far from being but a little lower than the angels, that he is fcarcely above the accuifed fpirits, and by no means equal to many of the brutes, who often exhibit moft amiable inftances of a good heart in the virtues of gratitude, fincere affection, and fidelity.

No. CIV. ON THE CHARACTERS OF THEOPHRASTUS.

It

F portraits of the ancient Athenians, painted from the life by the artists of the times, had defcended to the prefent age, they would have attracted univerfal notice, and have been justly confidered as invaluable. 'The productions, however, of the pencil are not proof against the corrosions of time; but though we have no original pictures of the perfons of the antient Athenians, we have admirable sketches of their minds delineated by Theophraftus. I do not mean descriptions of heroes, philofophers, or poets. They are to be found in the writings of the hiftorian. Theophraftus has taken his models from private and common life; from perfons too obfcure to adorn the page of history, but who conftitute fubjects well adapted to the purpofe of him who ftudies the anatomy of human nature. It is, indeed, extremely curious and amufing to discover ftrokes of

character

character in the citizens of Athens, who lived above two thousand years ago, exactly fimilar to the manners of the prefent day as they appear in London, and in other parts of civilized Europe.

Theophraftus entered on the undertaking of delineating the characters of his countrymen at the age of ninety-nine; an age at which he had treasured up a multitude of ideas from converse and observation. His defign was to ftigmatize follies, foibles, and little vices. rather than atrocious crimes. He meant, as he informs us himself in his preface, that pofterity should learn from the patterns which he should leave them, to judge of characters with accurate difcrimination, and to select fuch perfons for friendship and acquaintance as might communicate excellence equal to their own, by exciting a fpirit of generous emulation.

I will transcribe a fingle extract for the amusement of my reader, defiring him to keep in his mind the idea, that the writer of the character, and the perfon characterized, lived above three hundred years before the Chriftian æra. It will also be proper, in order to receive all the pleafure which the perufal of Theophraftus is capable of affording, that the reader fhould confider, whether many features of the character have not fallen under his own observation.

The following paffage is taken from his fection on the art of pleafing; and fhews, that this boafted art, as it is now taught, is no modern difcovery; but is, at all times, the genuine offspring of meannefs and felfintereft.

"The art of pleafing," fays he, " is a kind of behaviour in the company of another, which tends, indeed, to give pleasure, but not for the beft of purposes. The perfon who studies it, is fuch an one as, after having faluted a man a great way off, and called him the best man in the world, and admired him fufficiently, takes him by both his hands, and will not let him go; but accompanying him a little way, afks when he fhall have the pleasure of feeing him again; nor does he take leave after all without a thousand compliments and praises. When he is called in as an arbitrator, he is not only defirous of pleafing the party on whofe

fide he appears, but the adverfary alfo, that he may feem to be the common friend of both. He tells a foreign gentleman, that he really fpeaks the language with a better accent than the natives. When he is invited to dinner, he infifts upon the gentleman's letting the little children come in, and the moment he fees them, he declares, they are more like their father than one fig is like another; and taking them by the hand, he kiffes them, and makes them fit next to him, and plays with them himself, faying, here is a little trinket for one, and here is a little hatchet for the other; and he lets them fall afleep on his lap, feeming to be highly delighted, though he fits on thorns all the while. He fhaves his face very often; he keeps his teeth accurately clean; lays afide his clothes, even while they are good, because the fashion is changed, and takes care to be perfumed with the beft perfume. In all public places he is feen talking, or fitting, with the principal perfons, &c.” It is not confiftent with my defign to fill my paper with citations, or it would be eafy to produce many antient pieces from this moral painter, which deferve to be highly efteemed on account of the age and curiosity. The paintings, it must be owned, are rather in the Flemifh ftyle, and many of them partake of the caricatura.

But though I commend the pieces as curiofities, I would by no means be understood to praise them as perfect, or as ftandards for imitation. Whether they have undergone mutilation or tranfpofitions, or whether the author, in extreme old age, had not spirits to review what he wrote, it is not eafy to determine: but it is certain, that there is often a total want of connection, and that many ftrokes are admitted not at all applicable to the character to which they are applied. Indeed it appears probable, that the characters were real ones, and the remarks perfonal. So that though the author began with a general foible or folly, yet, purfuing the model from which he drew in all its parts, he was led, by an accurate delineation of the whole, to fome particularities not at all connected with the predominant features of the general character.

With refpect to the ftyle of this little book, I cannot difcover any beauties fo peculiarly ftriking as could

induce Ariftotle to change this author's name from Tyrtamus to that of Theophraftus. There were, however, it is probable, in his other works, fome very diftinguished excellencies of diction, fince they procured him, from one of the best critics whom the world ever faw, a name, which fignified, that he expreffed himself like a god. Diogenes Laertius informs us, that he wrote no fewer than two hundred and twenty books; but fcarcely any of them have escaped the hand of envious time. The characters are greatly mutilated, and many of them loft. It is, indeed, fuppofed, that, as in this treatife he has reprefented faults only, he wrote another, in which he prefented to the view the more amiable picture of virtuous and agreeable characters. Very high commendations are paid to his Treatife on Plants; but it is but little read, fince the great improvements which have been made by the moderns in the fcience of botany. Upon the whole of his character, Cafaubon appears to have remarked, with justice, that he was worthy of that age which produced the glorious triumvirate, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.

Many commentaries have been written to facilitate the reading of the characters; but I cannot help thinking, that this is one of the few antient books, in the illuftration of which, learning is lefs neceffary than a knowledge of the world.

No. CV. ON SEVERAL PASSAGES IN THE ENCHIRIDION OR MANUAL OF EPICTETUS.

T

HERE is fcarcely any of the philofophical feet which has not adopted fome abfurdity amidst a great variety of wife and valuable doctrine. Like all inventors and felectors of their own fyftems, they have been hurried to excefs, and have difgraced the rational parts of their philofophy by far-fetched refinements, or by foolish tenets, which could originate only in the madness of enthufiafm. The ftoical fyftem, beautiful and noble as it is in a general view, abounds with

blemishes

blemishes which have almoft rendered it contemptible. It may, indeed, be faid, in vindication of them, that they have a tendency to raise and ftrengthen human nature; while the errors of many other fyftems tend only to indulge its paffions, and to increase its infirmity.

I fhall prefent my reader with a few extracts from the admirable Enchiridion; divefting them of the abfurd doctrines, and retaining only what is really practicable and interefting to mankind at large, independently of any philofophical fyftem. The paffages are well known to the learned, to whofe notice it would be fuperfluous to addrefs them. They are more particularly intended for the use of the young; and of those who, from their engagements in active or commercial life, have not time for the study of Epictetus. Readers of this defcription will, I hope, find them not only very curious, but useful fpecimens of heathen wisdom. I fhall tranfcribe the few paffages which the limits of my paper will admit, from the translation of a lady, who has long done honour to her fex, and to English literature.

will

Require not things to happen as you wish; but wifh them to happen as they do happen, and you go on well.

"Remember that you must behave in life as at an entertainment. Is any thing brought round to you? Put out your hand and take your fhare with moderation. Does it pafs by you? Do not flop it. Is it not yet come? Do not ftretch forth your defire towards it, but wait till it reaches you. Thus do with regard to children, to a wife, to public pofts, to riches; and you will be some time or other a worthy partner of the feafts of the gods.

Remember that you are an actor in a drama, of fuch kind as the author pleases to make it. If short, of a short one; if long, of a long one. If it be his pleasure you should act a poor man, a cripple, a governor, or a private perfon, fee that you act it naturally. For this is your bufinefs, to act well the character affigned you. To chufe it, is another's.

"If you have an earnest defire of attaining to phi lofophy, prepare yourself from the very firft to be

laughed