purple. This rare shell is an East-Indian, and whenever it appears at an auction is rated very high. I have known ten guineas given for a perfect one. With a large quantity of these most beautiful fhells, which are rarely feen in any collections, and with all the family of the pectens, the cardia, the folens, the cylindri, the murexes, the turbines, the buccina, and every fpecies of the finest genera of fhells, Mifs Noel formed a grotto that exceeded every thing of the kind I believe in the world; all I am sure that I have seen, except the late Mrs. Harcourt's in Richmondfire; which I fhall give my Reader a defcription of, when I travel him up those English Alpes. It was not only, that Mifs Noel's happy fancy had blended all these things in the wildest and most beautiful difpofition over the walls of the rotunda; but her fine genius had produced a variety of grotts within her grotto, and falling wa ters, and points of view. In one place, was the famous Atalanta, and her delightful cave and in another part, the Goddess and Ulyffes's fon appeared at the entrance of that grott, which under the appearance of a rural plainnefs had every thing could charm the eye: the roof was ornamented with fhell-work; the tapestry was a tender vine i E 3 An image of Epictetus and a remarkable vine; and limpid fountains sweetly purled round. But what above all the finely fancyed works in Mifs Noel's grotto pleafed me, was, a figure of the Philofopher Epictetus, in the Legend. centre of the grott. He fat at the door of a cave, by the fide of a falling water, and held a book of his philofophy in his hand, that was written in the manner of the antients, that is, on parchment rolled up clofe together. He appeared in deep meditation, and as part of the book had been unwrapped and gradually extended, from his knee on the ground, one could read very plain, in large Greek characters, about fifty lines. The English of the leffon was this. The MASTER SCIENCE. All things have their nature, their make and form, by which they act, and by which they fuffer. The vegetable proceeds with perfect infenfibility. The brute poffeffes a fenfe of what is pleasurable and painful, but ftops at mere fenfation. The rational, like the brute, has all the powers of mere fenfation, but enjoys a farther transcendent faculty. To him is imparted the masterfcience of what he is, where he is, and the end to which he is deftined. He is directed by the canon of reason to reverence the dig nity of his own fuperior character, and never wretchedly degrade himself into natures to him fubordinate. The master science (he is told) confifts in having juft ideas of pleafures and pains, true notions of the moments and confequences of different actions and pursuits, whereby he may be able to meafure, direct or controul his defires or aver fions, and never merge into miferies. Remember this, Arrianus. Then only you are qualified for life, when you are able to oppose your appetites, and bravely dare to call your opinions to account; when you have established judgment or reason as the ruler in your mind, and by a patience of thinking, and a power of refifting, before you choose, can bring your fancy to the test of truth. By this means, furnished with the knowledge of the effects and confequences of actions, you will know how you ought to behave in every cafe. You will fteer wifely through the various rocks and fhelves of life. In fhort, Arrianus, the deliberate habit is the proper bufinefs of man; and his duty, to exert upon the first proper call, the virtues natural to his mind; that piety, that love, that juftice, that veracity, that gratitude, that benevolence; which are the glory of human kind. Whatever is fated in that order of incontroulable events, by which the divine power preferves and adorns E 4 the Old Mr. Noel's character. the whole, meet the incidents with magnani- This is the This do, and you will be a fit actor in the general drama; and the only end of your exiftence is the due performance of the part allotted you. Such was Mifs Noel's grotto, and with her, if it had been in my power to choose, I had rather have paffed in it, the day in talking of the various fine fubjects it contained, than go in to dinner; which a fervant informed us was ferving up, juft as I had done reading the above recited philofophical leffon. Back then we returned to the parlour, aud there found the old Gentleman. We fat down immediately to two very good dishes, and when that was over, Mr. Noel and I drank a bottle of old Alicant. Tho' this Gentleman was upwards of eighty, yet years had not deprived him of reafon and fpirits. He was lively and fenfible, and still a most agreeable companion. He talked of Greece and Rome, as if he had lived there before the Era of chriftianity. The court of Auguftus he was fo far from being a stranger to, to, that he described the principal perfons in it; their actions, their pleasures, and their caprices, as if he had been their contemporary. We talked of all these great characters. We went into the the gallery of Verres. We looked over the antient theatres. Several of the most beautiful paffages in the Roman poets this fine old man repeated, and made very pleasant, but moral remarks upon them. The cry (faid he) ftill is as it was in the days of Horace O cives, cives, quaerenda pecunia primum, Virtus poft nummos. Unde babeas nemo quaerit, fed oportet habere. Quorum animis, a priina lanugine, non insedit illud? And what Catullus told his Lefbia, is it not approved to this day by the largest part of the great female world? Vivamus, mea Lefbia, atque amemus, Soles occidere et redire poffunt, Hæc difcunt omnes ante Alpha & Beta puellæ. The girls all learn this leffon before their A. |