object to refer men in all their actions, opinions, and even enjoyments to an appropriate Rule, and to aid them with all the means I possess, by the knowledge of the facts on which such Rule grounds itself. The rules of political prudence do indeed depend on local and temporary circumstances in a much greater degree than those of Morality or even those of Taste. Still however the circumstances being known, the deductions obey the same law, and must be referred to the same arbiter. In a late summary reperusal of our more celebrated periodical Essays, by the contemporaries of Addison and those of Johnson, it appeared to me that the objects of the Writers were, either to lead the reader from gross enjoyments and boisterous amusements, by gradually familiarizing them with more quiet and refined pleasures; or to make the habits of domestic life and public demeanour more consistent with decorum and good sense, by laughing away the lesser follies, and freaks of self-vexation; or to arm the yet vir- tuous mind with horror of the direr crimes and vices, by exemplifying their origin, progress, and results, in affecting Tales and true or fictitious biography: or where (as in the Rambler) it is intended to strike a yet deeper note, to support the cause of Religion and Morality by eloquent declamation and dogmatic precept, such as may with propriety be addressed to those, who require to be awakened rather than convinced, whose conduct is incongruous with their own sober convictions; in short, to practical not speculative Heretics. Revered for ever be the names of these great and good men! Immortal be their Fame; and may Love and Honour and Docility of Heart in their readers, constitute its' essentials! Not without cruel injustice should I be accused or suspected of a wish to underrate their merits, because in journeying toward the same end I have chosen a different road. Not wantonly however have I ventured even on this variation. I have decided on it in consequence of all the Observations which I have made on my fellow-creatures, since I have been able to observe in calmness on the present age, and to compare its' phænomena with the best indications, we possess, of the character of the ages before us.

My time since earliest manhood has been pretty equally divided between deep retirement (with little other society than that of one family, and my Library) and the occupations and intercourse of (comparatively at least)

public life both abroad and in the British Metropolis. But in fact the deepest retirement, in which a well-educated Englishman of active feelings, and no misanthrope, can live at present, supposes few of the disadvantages and negations, which a similar place of residence would have involved, a century past. Independent of the essential knowledge to be derived from books, children, housemates, and neighbours, however few or humble; yet Newspapers; their Advertisements, their Reports of the Speeches in Parliament, in Law-courts, and in Public Meetings; Reviews, Magazines, Obituaries; and (as affording occasional commentaries on all these (the frequency of Travelling, and the variety of character and object in the Travellers; and more than all, the diffusion of opinions, the uniformity of Behaviour and Appearance, and the telegraphic Spread and beacon-like Rapidity of. Fashion in things external and internal; have combined to diminish, and often to render evanescent, the distinctions between the enlightened Inhabitants of the great city, and the scattered hamlet. From all the facts however, that have occurred as subjects of reflection within the sphere of my experience, be they few or numerous, I have fully persuaded my own mind, that formerly MEN WERE WORSE THAN THEIR PRINCIPLES, but that at present THE PRINCIPLES ARE WORSE THAN THE MEN. For the former half of the proposition I might among a thousand other more serious and unpleasant proofs appeal even to the Spectators and Tatlers. It would not be easy perhaps to detect in them any great corruption or debasement of the main foundations of Truth and Goodness, yet a man—I will not say of delicate mind and pure morals but-of common good manners, who means to read an essay, which he has opened upon at hazard in these Volumes, to a mixed company, will find it necessary to take a previous survey of its contents. If stronger illustration be required, I would refer to one of Shadwell's Comedies in connection with its Dedication to the Dutchess of Newcastle, encouraged, as he says, by the high delight with which her Grace had listened to the Author's private recitation of the Manuscript in her Closet. A writer of the present Day, who should dare address such a composition to a virtuous Matron of high rank, would secure general infamy, and run no small risk of Bridewell and the Pillory. Why need I add the plays and poems of

Dryden contrasted with his serious prefaces and declarations of his own religious and moral opinions? why the little success, except among the heroes and heroines of fashionable Life. of the two or three living Writers of prurient Love-odes (if I may be forgiven for thus profaning the word, Love) and Novels at once terrific and libidinous. These Gentlemen erred both in place and time, and have understood the temper of their age and country as ill as the precepts of that Bible, which, notwithstanding the atrocious Blasphemies of one of them, the great majority of their countrymen peruse with safety to their morals, if not improvement.

The truth of the latter half of the proposition in its' favourable part, is evidenced by the general anxiety on the subject of Education, the solicitous attention paid to several late works on its' general principles, and the unexampled Sale of the very numerous large and small volumes published for the use of Parents and Instructors, and for the children given or intrusted to their Charge. The first ten or twelve leaves of our old Almanac Books, and the copper-plates of old Ladies' Magazines and similar publications, will afford in the fashions and head-dresses of our Grandmothers, contrasted with the present simple ornaments of women in general, a less important but not less striking elucidation of my meaning. The wide diffusion of moral information, in no slight degree owing to the volumes of our popular Essayists, has undoubtedly been on the whole beneficent. But above all, the recent events, (say rather, tremendous explosions) the thunder and earthquakes and deluge of the political world, have forced habits of greater thoughtfulness on the minds of men: particularly in our own Island, where the instruction has been acquired without the stupifying influences of terror or actual calamity. We have been compelled to acknowledge (what our Fathers would have perhaps called it want of liberality to assert) the close connection between private libertinism and national subversion. To those familiar with the state of morals and the ordinary subjects of afterdinner conversation, at least among the young men, in Oxford and Cambridge only twenty or twenty five years back, I might with pleasure point out, in support of my thesis, the present state of our two Universities, which has rather superseded, than been produced by, any additional vigilence or austerity of discipline.

The unwelcome remainder of the proposition, the "feet of iron and clay," the unsteadiness, or falsehood or abasement of the Principles, which are taught and received by the existing generation, it is the chief purpose and general business of" THE FRIEND" to examine, to evince and, (as far as my own forces extend, increased by the contingents which, I flatter myself, will be occasionally furnished by abler patrons of the same Cause,) to remedy or alleviate. That my efforts will effect little, I am fully conscious; but by no means admit, that little is to be effected. The squire of low degree may announce the approach of puissant Knight; yea, the Giant may even condescend to lift up the feeble Dwarf and permit it to blow the Horn of Defiance on his Shoulders.

PRINCIPLES therefore, their subordination, their connection, and their application, in all the divisions of our duties and of our pleasures-this is my Chapter of Con tents. May I not hope for a candid interpretation of my motive, if I again recur to the possible apprehension, on the part of my readers, that THE FRIEND

"O'erlaid with Black, staid Wisdom's Hue"

with eye fixed in abstruse research and brow of perpetual Wrinkle is to frown away the light-hearted Graces, and "unreproved Pleasures"; or invite his Guests to a dinner of herbs in a Hermit's Cell? if I affirm, that my Plan' does not in itself exclude either impassioned style or interesting Narrative, Tale, or Allegory, or Anecdote; and that the defect will originate in my Abilities not in my Wishes or Efforts, If I fail to bring forward,

"due at my hour prepar'd

For dinner savory fruits, of taste to please

True appetite

In order, so contriv'd as not to mix

Tastes, not well join'd inelegant; but bring

Taste after Taste upheld with kindliest Change."
PAR. LOST. V.

I have said in my first Number, that my very system compels me to make every fair appeal to the feelings, the Imagination, and even the Fancy. If these are to be withheld from the service of Truth, Virtue, and Happiness, to what purpose were they given? in whose service are they retained? I have indeed considered the disproportion of human' Passions to their ordinary Objects among the strongest internal evidences of our future destination, and

the attempt to restore them to their rightful Claimants, the most imperious Duty and the noblest Task of Genius. The verbal enunciation of this Master Truth could scarcely be new to me at any period of my Life since earliest Youth; but I well remember the particular time, when the words first became more than words to me, when they incorporated with a living conviction, and took their place among the realities of my Being. On some wide Common or open Heath, peopled with Ant-hills, during some one of the grey cloudy days of late Autumn, many of my Readers may have noticed the effect of a sudden and momentary flash of Sunshine on all the countless little animals within his view, aware too that the self-same influence was darted co-instantaneously over all their swarming cities as far as his eye could reach; may have observed, with what a kindly force the Gleam stirs and quickens them all! and will have experienced no unpleasurable shock of Feeling in seeing myriads of myriads of living and sentient Beings united at the same moment in one gay sensation, one joyous activity! But aweful indeed is the same appearance in a multitude of rational Beings, our fellow-men, in whom too the effect is produced not so much by the external occasion as from the active quality of their own thoughts. I had walked from Gottingen in the year 1799, to witness the arrival of the Queen of Prussia, on her visit to the Baron Von Hartzberg's Seat, five miles from the University. The spacious Outer Court of the Palace was crowded with men and women, a sea of Heads, with a number of children rising out of it from their Father's shoulders. After a Buz of two hours' expectation, the avant-courier rode at full speed into the Court. At the loud cracks of his long whip and the trampling of his horses' hoofs, the universal Shock and Thrill of Emotion-I have not language to convey it-expressed as it was in such manifold looks, gestures, and attitudes, yet with one and the same feeling in the eyes of all! Recovering from the first inevi table contagion of Sympathy, I involuntarily exclaimed, though in a language to myself alone intelligible, Man! ever nobler than thy circumstances! Spread but the mist of obscure feeling over any form, and even a woman incapable of blessing or of injury to thee, shall be welcomed with an intensity of emotion adequate to the reception of the Redeemer of the World !"

1

O

It has ever been my opinion, that an excessive solicitude to avoid the use of our first personal pronoun more often