improvement, if I mistake not, is visible from about N° 82 or 83; N° 92, 95, 109, and 132, may be referred to for their superior excellence. The latter is much in the Addisonian manner. STEELE's admirable papers on duelling were among the first successful attacks on that remnant of barbarism. They are supposed to have been originally written in consequence of his being involved in a duel with a brother officer of the Coldstream regiment, about the year 1706.

It may be necessary, however, to mention that, in assigning the papers of the TATLER to their respective authors, we have better authority to follow in almost every case than in that of STEELE himself, because it has been the custom to prefix his name to every paper of which no other writer is known. In this arrangement, he is the ostensible author of upwards of one hundred and seventy of these papers; but it must be observed, that although as Editor of the papers he was responsible for their contents, he composed many of them from the contributions or hints of his correspondents, principally short letters written by the wits of the age, in which they sometimes imitated his manner with a considerable degree of success; and not unfrequently he borrowed from his library short extracts, which he reprinted with an introduction or comment. On one occasion of very pinching distress, he began a Journal of the Iliad, of which he seems afterwards ashamed; and f

VOL. I.

on another occasion he published some private letters he had sent to his second wife. These shifts, however, occur chiefly among the earlier papers: his matter soon became proportioned to his wants; and he acquired, by constant efforts, a happier and easier mode of communicating his observations on life and

manners.

It appears that some part of the popularity of the TATLERS, during their first publication, was owing to a very prevalent opinion, that the characters described in an unfavourable light, and held up to ridicule or contempt, were real. Of this many hints are given; and the question is very artfully obscured in every attempt to decide it. That some of the characters, both good and bad, were real, has been ascertained beyond all doubt: allusions to the events of the times are so frequent as to render it necessary to introduce the actors. We may instance the Bangorian controversy, which in itself however was perhaps too serious for the kind of ridicule employed. Religious controversy, when conducted with asperity and calumny, might often afford a proper subject of ridicule; but the attempt is dangerous, and we must never forget that the matter or object of all religious controversy, however misrepresented, is of eternal importance. The peevishness of Bishop BLACKALL, it must notwithstanding be confessed, is parodied with great humour in the letters of the Puppet show-man, which have been

admired by many readers who looked no farther than to the affected consequence of a vagrant of that mean employment. In No 51, STEELE has apologised for his interference in this controversy with considerable shrewd

ness.

Besides the gamblers, many of whom were certainly real characters, a few of a more harmless cast are introduced, as RATCLIFF and ARNE; but in general, the allusions to living characters, not of the depraved kind, are free from asperity or malevolence. One exception, indeed, occurs in the case of MADONELLA (Mrs. MARY ASTELL), and of Mrs. ELIZABETH ELSTOB, two ladies of unblemished character, and great literary accomplishments; but let it be remembered, that these calumnies are both from the pen of SWIFT.

The general opinion, however, that all the characters delineated or alluded to, were real, certainly kept up the public attention to these papers; and the authors, being aware that nothing can render a work more popular than the supposition that it contains a proportion of scandal or personal history, were not very anxious to deprive themselves of a hold on the public mind which they could, and had the virtue to turn to the best of purposes. In writings of this kind, it is essential that vice and folly should be illustrated by characters; it is this which distinguishes them from dissertations of the more serious cast: and to

readers of a certain description, it is a delightful employment to reduce fictitious to real names, conjecture wisely on place and person, and find resemblances where none were meant. Our authors cannot therefore be very severely blamed if they occasionally played with this species of self-deception, and, knowing the perverted taste of some of their customers, sold them lawful goods as contraband.

The chief design of all these papers is briefly expressed by Hughes in N° 64, to be 'a wholesome project of making wit useful,' a project the more to be commended, as of all talents wit is the most liable to be abused; and as for many years preceding the date of the TATLER, the most celebrated wits had prostituted their pens in the service of the grosser vices. Few men could be better qualified than STEELE to employ this endowment in useful designs. Notwithstanding his personal failings, he appears to have uniformly entertained the purest principles of religion and morals: a strong sense of propriety in words as well as in action: and an abhorrence of gross vices, as offensive to the Deity, and dangerous to the eternal welfare of man. When betrayed by liveliness of temper into an expression inconsistent with piety or decency, he was ever ready to apologize and to revoke: if he committed errors, he certainly defended none. In manners, he had a quick sense of what was ridiculous, and exposed it with easy playfulness, or humorous gravity. Availing himself of the

many shapes an ESSAYIST may assume, he exposed levity of conduct, absurd fashions, improprieties of dress and discourse, in every various light; and laid the foundation for a change in the public mind, which has contributed beyond all calculation to the refinement of society.

It has already been noticed that he is not to be accounted the writer of every paper to which his name has been prefixed or appended. Those which appear in the regular form of ESSAY are certainly his; those consisting of letters, &c. were sometimes the contributions of correspondents. With respect to his able coadjutor, we are less liable to mistake. ADDISON'S papers have been correctly ascertained, yet the frequent resemblance between these two writers in style and manner, is a circumstance which deserves particular notice. We have seen that STEELE was the original author of the TATLER; that he was the first who prescribed a mode of periodical writing, new to the world from the nature of its subjects; and that he had made some progress before he received, or appears to have expected, assistance from ADDISON, who was then in a distant country*, and in an official situation not likely to afford him the requisite leisure. Yet from the time they began to write in conjunction, if the reader will attentively compare those papers which are certainly the respective productions * Addison left London April 10, two days before the first appearance of the Tatler.