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land had no masters of common life. No writers had yet undertaken to reform either the savageness of neglect, or the impertinence of civility; to shew when to speak, or to be silent; how to refuse, or how to comply. We had many books to teach us our more important duties, and to settle opinions in philosophy or politics: but an Arbiter elegantiarum, a judge of propriety, was yet wanting, who should survey the track of daily conversation, and free it from thorns and prickles, which teaze the passer, though they do not wound him.

For this purpose nothing is so proper as the frequent publication of short papers, which we read not as study, but amusement. If the subject be slight, the treatise likewise is short. The busy may find time, and the idle may find patience.

This mode of conveying cheap and easy knowledge, began among us in the civil war, when it was much the interest of either party to raise and fix the prejudices of the people. At that time appeared Mercurius Aulicus, Mercurius Rusticus, and Mercurius Civicus. It is said that when any title grew popular, it was stolen by the antagonist, who by this stratagem conveyed his notions to those who would not have received him, had he not worn the appearance of a friend. The tumult of those unhappy days left scarcely any man leisure to treasure up occasional compositions;

and so much were they neglected, that a complete collection is no where to be found.

These Mercuries were succeeded by L'ESTRANGE'S OBSERVATOR, and that by LESLEY'S REHEARSAL, and perhaps by others: but hitherto nothing had been conveyed to the people, in this commodious manner, but controversy relating to the church or state ;. of which they taught many to talk, whom they could not teach to judge.

"It has been suggested that the Royal Society was instituted soon after the Restoration, to divert the attention of the people from public discontent. The TATLER and SPECTATOR had the same tendency: they were published at a time when two parties, loud, restless, and violent, each with plausible declarations, and each perhaps without any distinct termination of its views, were agitating the nation to minds heated with political contest, they supplied cooler and more inoffensive reflections; and it is said by ADDISON, in a subsequent work, that they had a perceptible influence upon the conversation of that time, and taught the frolic and the gay to unite merriment with decency; an effect which they can never wholly lose, while they continue to be among the first books by which both sexes are initiated in the elegancies of knowledge.**

In this sketch, we may observe, that the praise of original design is still reserved for the author of the TATLER. If Casa and Cas

*Johnson's Life of Addison

tiglione were allowed to be exceptions, we might add to the number by reciting the titles of many works published in England, for the regulation of manners; among these PEACHAM, BRAITHWAITE, and Sir FRANCIS VERE, were writers of no inconsiderable fame; but, like many of their contemporaries, much more valuable for matter than manner. Essayists on general subjects were likewise numerous: FELTHAM'S Resolves was once a very popular book, and has more. merit than will be allowed by those who are anxious rather to be pleased than to be instructed; and it would be unpardonable to omit the Essays of LORD BACON, which for sound philosophy and accurate observation, have not been exceeded, nor perhaps equalled.* Translations were also published from Montaigne, and other foreign authors; but still no attempt had been made on the plan of the PERIODICAL ESSAY, confined alone to life and manners.

With regard to the theatre, much good could certainly not be expected from it. Perhaps in its nature, it is not a direct source of instruction. It reflects, but does not prescribe manners; it represents, but does not invent. Common life and manners are unquestionably the materials upon which a dramatic writer is to exercise his wit; but the stage has never been considered as a master of common life, or as editing the laws of manners. It has seldom succeeded even in cor* Beattie.

recting what is amiss, although by flattering the depraved taste or morals of certain periods, it has often made bad worse. During the reign of CHARLES II. and JAMES II. the stage was in all respects so licentious that the comedies then represented are now declared unfit to be read; and Dr. JOHNSON has acknowledged, when speaking of certainly not the worst dramatic writer of his age, that the perusal of his works will make no man better; and that their ultimate effect is to represent pleasure in alliance with vice; and to relax those obligations by which life ought to be regulated.'*

If it was the purpose of the first ESSAYISTS to detach the public from political controversy, and to direct their attention to subjects that, like those of LORD VERULAM,

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home to men's business and bosoms,' a most extensive field lay before them, for the cultivation of which little provision had been made by preceding authors. There were innumerable topics, which, though of great importance in promoting regularity and propriety in social life, and securing the happiness of the domestic relations, had been but slightly touched by any of the teachers of wisdom. 'The weightier morals and the Christian virtues, the grosser vices and depravities, were indeed sufficiently considered in the public discourses of our English Divines, which form a body of religious and moral instruc* Johnson's Life of Congreve.

tion, such as no other nation can hope to rival; but the freaks and vagaries of fashion*, operating upon various tempers, and creating many varieties of character, and many modifications of absurdity, whatever influence they might have upon society, were excluded from a place where nothing can intrude but what is capable of grave discussion. SENECA, and a few more modern writers, had given the world their thoughts on such subjects, as they presented themselves in the people whom they addressed: but at this time, no nation on earth was so happily favourable to the genius of the PERIODICAL ESSAYISTS as our own: and it is the peculiarity of our political constitution and manners, which has since enabled the English to maintain a preference in this species of composition, to which foreign writers have hitherto aspired in vain.

No man can make a just estimate of the literature of any country who does not take into his consideration its political government, and the advantages or obstructions which they may present to genius and imagination. If our ESSAYISTs have excelled in humour, they owe their materials and their

Too trivial for the chastisement of the law, and too fantastical for the cognizance of the pulpit.' Spec. No. 34, cne of the purest specimens of Addisonian humour. Pope has harmonized this observation;

'Safe from the bar, the pulpit, and the throne,
Yet touch'd and sham'd by Ridicule alone.'

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