that is shot at him, and puts it in the power of every insignificant enemy to disquiet him. Nay, he will suffer from what has been said of him, when it is for. gotten by those who said or heard it. For this reason I could never bear one of those officious friends, that would be telling every malicious report, every idle censure that passed upon me. The tongue of man is so petulant, and his thoughts so variable, that one should not lay too great a stress upon any present speeches and opinions. Praise and obloquy proceed very frequently out of the same mouth upon the same person, and upon the same occasion. A generous enemy will sometimes bestow commendations, as the dearest friend cannot sometimes refrain from speaking ill. The man who is indifferent in either of these respects, gives his opinion at random, and praises or disapproyes as he finds himself in humour. I shall conclude this essay with a part of a character, which is finely drawn by the Earl of Clarendon, in the first book of his History, and which gives us the lively picture of a great man teizing himself with an absurd curiosity. "He had not that application and submission, and reverence for the queen, as might have been expected from his wisdom and breeding; and often crossed her pretences and desires with more rudeness than was natural to him. Yet he was impertinently solicitous to know what her Majesty said of him in private, and what resentments she had towards him. And when by some confidents, who had their ends upon him from those offices, he was informed of some bitter expressions fallen from her Majesty, he was so exceed. ingly afflicted and tormented with the sense of it, that sometimes by passionate complaints and representations to the king; sometimes by more dutiful addresses and expostulations with the queen, in bewailing his misfortune; he frequently exposed himself, and left his condition worse than it was before, and the eclair 6 cissement commonly ended in the discovery of the persons from whom he had received his most secret intelligence." C. THE following morning's dream I shall communi cate to my reader, rather as the first sketch and outlines of a vision, than as a finished piece. I dreamed that I was admitted into a long spacious gallery, which had one side covered with pieces of all the famous painters who are now living, and the other with the works of the greatest masters that are dead. On the side of the living, I saw several persons busy in drawing, colouring, and designing. On the side of the dead painters, I could not discover more than one person at work, who was exceeding slow in his motions, and wonderfully nice in his touches. I was resolved to examine the several artists that stood before me, and accordingly applied myself to the side of the living. The first I observed at work in this part of the gallery was Vanity, with his hair tied behind him in a ribbon, and dressed like a Frenchman. All the faces he drew were very remarkable for their smiles, and a certain smirking air which he bestowed indifferently on every age and degree of either sex. The toujours gai appeared even in his judges, bishops, and privy-counsellors. In a word, all his men were petits maitres, and all his women coquettes. The drapery of his figures was extremely well suited to his faces, and was made up of all the glaring colours that could be mixed together; every part of the dress was in a flutter, and endeavoured to distinguish itself above the rest. On the left hand of Vanity stood a laborious workman, who I found was his. humble admirer, and copied after him. He was dressed like a German, and had a very hard name that sounded something like Stupidity. The third artist that I looked over was Fantasque, dressed like a Venetian scaramouch. He had an excellent hand at chimera, and dealt very much in distortions and grimaces. He would sometines affright bimself with the phantoms that flowed from his pencil. In short, the most elaborate of his pieces was at best but a terrifying dream; and one could say nothing more of his finest figures, than that they were agreeable monsters. The fourth person I examined was very remarkable for his hasty hand, which left his pictures so unfinished, that the beauty in the picture (which was designed to continue as a monument of it to posterity) faded sooner than in the person after whom it was drawn. He made so much haste to dispatch his business, that he neither gave himself time to clean his pencils, nor mix his colours. The name of this expeditious work man was Avarice. Not far from this artist I saw another of a quite different nature, who was dressed in the habit of a Dutchman, and known by the name of Industry. His figures were wonderfully laboured. If he drew the portraiture of a man, he did not omit a single hair in his face; if the figure of a ship, there was not a rope among the tackle that escaped him. He had likewise hung a great part of the wall with night-pieces, that seemed to show themselves by the candies which were lighted up in several parts of them; and were so in flamed by the sun-shine which accidentally fell upon them, that at first sight I could scarce forbear crying out fire. The five foregoing artists were the most considerable on this side of the gallery; there were indeed several others whom I had not time to look into. One of them, however, I could not forbear observing, who was very busy in retouching the finest pieces, though he produced no originals of his own. His pencil aggravated every feature that was before overcharged, loaded every defect, and poisoned every colour it touched. Though this workman did so much mischief on the side of the living, he never turned his eye towards that of the dead. His name was Envy. Having taken a cursory view of one side of the gallery, I turned myself to that which was filled by the works of those great masters that were dead; when immediately I fancied myself standing before a multitude of spectators, and thousands of eyes looking upon me at once; for all before me appeared so like men and women, that I almost forgot they were pictures. Raphael's figures stood in one row, Titian's in another, Guido Rheni's in a third. One part of the wall was peopled by Hannibal Carrache, another by Correggio, and another by Rubens. To be short, there was not a great master among the dead who had not contributed to the embellishment of this side of the gallery. The persons that owed their being to these several masters, appeared all of them to be real and alive, and differed among one another only in the variety of their shapes, complexions, and clothes; so that they looked like different nations of the same species. Observing an old man (who was the same person I before mentioned, as the only artist that was at work on this side of the gallery) creeping up and down from one picture to another, and retouching all the fine pieces that stood before me, I could not but be very attentive to all his motions. I found his pencil was so very light, that it worked imperceptibly, and after a thousand touches, scarce produced any visible effect on the picture in which he was employed. However, as he busied himself incessantly, and repeated touch after touch without rest or intermission, he wore off insensibly every little disagreeable gloss that hung upon a figure. He also added such a beautiful brown to the shades, and mellowness to the colours, that he made every picture appear more perfect than when it came fresh from the master's pencil. I could not forbear looking upon the face of this ancient workman, and immediately, by the long lock of hair upon his forehead, discovered him to be Time. Whether it was because the thread of my dream was at an end I cannot tell, but upon my taking a survey of this imaginary old man, my sleep left me. C. GLOOMY PRESAGES RIDICULED. Somnia, terrores magicos, miracula, sagas Visions and magic spells can you despise, HOR. GOING yesterday to dine with an old acquaintance, I had the misfortune to find his whole family very much dejected. Upon asking him the occasion of it, he told me that his wife had dreamt a strange dream the night before, which they were afraid portended some misfortune to themselves or to their children. At her coming into the room I observed a settled melancholy in her countenance, which I should have been troubled for, had I not heard from whence it proceeded. We were no sooner sat down, but after having looked upon me a little while, " my dear," says she, turning to her husband," you may now see! |