is my delight, I have made very few excursions, in the conversations which I have related, beyond a Yes or a No. By this means my readers have lost many good things which I have had in my heart, though I did not care for uttering them. Now in order to diversify my character, and to shew the world how well I can talk if I have a mind, 1 have thoughts of being very loquacious in the club which I have now under consideration. But that I may proceed the more regularly in this affair, I design, upon the first meeting of the said club, to have my mouth opened in form; intending to regulate myself in this particular by a certain ritual which I have by me, that contains all the ceremonies which are practised at the opening of the mouth of a cardinal. I have likewise examined the forms which were used of old by Pythagoras, when any of his scholars, after an apprenticeship of silence, was made free of his speech. In the mean time, as I have of late found my name in foreign gazettes upon less occasions, I question not but in their next articles from Great Britain they will inform the world, that the Spectator's mouth is to be opened on the twenty-fifth of March next.' I may perhaps publish a very useful paper at that time of the proceedings in that solemnity, and of the persons who shall assist at it. But of this more hereafter. 0. N° 551. TUESDAY, DEC. 2, 1712. Sic honor et nomen divinis vatibus atque Carminibus venit. HOR. Ars Poet. ver. 400. So ancient is the pedigree of verse, · MR. SPECTATOR, ROSCOMMON. WHEN men of worthy and excelling geniuses have obliged the world with beautiful and instructive writings, it is in the nature of gratitude that praise should be returned them, as one proper consequent reward of their performances. Nor has mankind ever been so degenerately sunk but they have made this return, and even when they have not been wrought up by the generous endeavour so as to receive the advantages designed by it. This praise, which arises first in the mouth of particular persons, spreads and lasts according to the merit of authors; and when it thus meets with a full success changes its denomination, and is called fame. They, who have happily arrived at this, are, even while they live, inflamed by the acknowledgments of others, and spurred on to new undertakings for the benefit of mankind, notwithstanding the detraction which some abject tempers would cast upon them: but when they decease, their characters being free from the shadow which envy laid them under, begin to shine with the greater splendour; their spirits survive in their works; they are admitted into the highest companies, and they continue pleasing and instructing posterity from age to age. Some of the best gain a character, by being able to shew that they are no strangers to them; and others obtain a new warmth to labour for the happiness and ease of mankind, from a reflection upon those honours which are paid to their memories. 'The thought of this took me up as I turned over those epigrams which are the remains of several of the wits of Greece, and perceived many dedicated to the fame of those who had excelled in beautiful poetic performances. Wherefore, in pursuance to my thought, I concluded to do something along with them to bring their praises into a new light and language, for the encouragement of those whose modest tempers may be deterred by the fear of envy or detraction from fair attempts, to which their parts might render them equal. You will perceive them as they follow to be conceived in the form of epitaphs, a sort of writing which is wholly set apart for a short-pointed method of praise. ON ORPHEUS, WRITTEN BY ANTIPATER. "No longer, Orpheus, shall thy sacred strains For thou art gone. The Muses mourn thy fall Observe here, that if we take the fable for granted, as it was believed to be in that age when the epigram was written, the turn appears to have piety to the gods, and a resigning spirit in its application. But if we consider the point with respect to our present knowledge, it will be less esteemed; though the author himself, because he believed it, may still be more valued than any one who should now write with a point of the same nature. ON HOMER, BY ALPHEUS OF MYTILene. "Still in our ears Andromache complains, The thought in the first part of this is natural, and depending upon the force of poesy; in the latter part it looks as if it would aim at the history of seven towns contending for the honour of Homer's birth-place; but when you expect to meet with that common story the poet slides by, and raises the whole world for a kind of arbiter, which is to end the contention amongst its several parts. ON ANACREON, BY ANTIPATER. "This tomb be thine, Anacreon! All around If any pleasure reach the shades below." The poet here written upon is an easy gay author, and he who writes upon him has filled his own head with the character of his subject. He seems to love his theme so much, that he thinks of nothing but pleasing him as if he were still alive, by entering into his libertine spirit; so that the humour is easy and gay, resembling Anacreon in its air, raised by such images, and painted with such a turn as he might have used. I give it a place here, because the author may have designed it for his honour; and I take an opportunity from it to advise others, that when they would praise they cautiously avoid every lower qualification, and fix only where there is a real foundation in merit. ON EURIPIDES, BY ION. "Divine Euripides, this tomb we see So much as thou for it, since all will own The thought here is fine, but its fault is, that it is general, that it may belong to any great man, because it points out no particular character. It would be better if, when we light upon such a turn, we join it with something that circumscribes and bounds it to the qualities of our subject. He who gives his praise in gross, will often appear either to have been a stranger to those he writes upon, or not to have found any thing in them which is praiseworthy. ON SOPHOCLES, BY SIMONIDES. This epigram I have opened more than any of the former: the thought towards the latter end seemed closer couched, so as to require an explanation. I fancied the poet aimed at the picture which is generally made of Apollo and the Muses, |