good health until his arrival upon the shore, where he suddenly relapsed, and expired upon a Ring's-end car in his way to Dublin. The same experiment was repeated several times in that reign, but to no purpose. A frog was never known to take three leaps upon Irish turf, before he stretched himself out, and died. Whether it were that the philosophers on this side the water despaired of stocking the island with this useful animal, or whether, in the following reign, it was not thought proper to undo the miracle of a popish saint; I do not hear of any further progress made in this affair until about two years after the battle of the Boyne.* It was then that an ingenious physician, to the honour as well as improvement of his native country,† performed what the English had been so long attempting in vain. This learned man, with the hazard of his life, made a voyage to Liverpool, where he filled several barrels with the choicest spawn of frogs that could be found in those parts. This cargo he brought over very carefully, and afterward disposed of it in several warm beds, that he thought most capable of bringing it to life. The doctor was a very ingenious physician and a very good protestant; for which reason to show his zeal against popery, he placed some of the most promising spawn in the very fountain that is dedicated to the saint, and known by the name of Saint Patrick's well, where these animals had the impudence to make their first appearance. They have, since that time, very much increased and multiplied in all the neighbourhood of this city. We have here some curious inquirers into natural history, who observe their motions with a design to compute in how many years they will be able to hop from Dublin to Wexford; though, as I am informed, not one of them has yet passed the mountains of Wicklow. From my own Apartment, October 13. COMING home last night before my usual hour, I took a book into my hand, in order to divert myself with it until bed-time. Milton chanced to be my author, whose admirable poem of Paradise Lost' serves at once to fill the mind with pleasing ideas, and with good thoughts, and was therefore the most proper book for my purpose. I was amusing myself with that beautiful passage in which the poet represents Eve sleeping by Adam's side, with the devil sitting at her car, and inspiring evil thoughts, under the shape of a toad. Ithuricl, one of the guardian angels of the place, walking his nightly rounds, saw the great enemy of mankind hid in this loathsome animal, which he touched with his spear. This spear being of a celestial temper, had such a secret virtue in it, that whatever it was applied to, immediately flung off all disguise, and appeared in its natural figure. I am afraid the reader will not pardon me, if I content myself with explaining the passage in prose, without giving it in the author's own in imitable words: -On he led his radiant files, Dazzling the morn. These to the bower direct, In search of whom they sought. Him there they found, Squat like a toad, close at the ear of Eve; Essaying by his devilish art to reach The organs of her fancy, and with them forge Illusions as he list, phantasms and dreams; Or if, inspiring venom, he might taint The animal spirits (that from pure blood arise Like gentle breaths from rivers pure,) thence raise At least distemper'd, discontented thoughts, Vain hopes, vain aims, inordinate desires, Blown up with high conceits, engendering pride. Him, this intent, Ithuriel with his spear Touch'd lightly; for no falsehood can endure Touch of celestial temper, but returns Of force to his own likeness. Up he starts Discover'd and surpris'd. As when a spark Lights on a heap of nitrous powder, laid Fit for the tun, some magazine to store Against a rumowe war, the smutty grain, With sudden blaż diffus'd, inflames the air; So started up in his own shape the fiend. I could not forbear thinking how happy a man would be in the possession of this spear; or what an advantage it would be to a minister of state were he master of such a white staff. It would help him to discover his friends from his enemies, men of abilities from pretenders: it would hinder him from being imposed upon by appearances and professions; and might be made use of as a kind of state-test, which no artifice could elude. These thoughts made very lively impressions | couple of coaches with purple liveries. There on my imagination, which were improved, instead of being defaced, by sleep, and produced in me the following dream: I was no sooner fallen asleep, but methought the angel Ithuriel appeared to me, and, with a smile that still added to his celestial beauty, made me a present of the spear which he held in his hand, and disappeared. To make trials of it, I went into a place of public resort. sat in each of them a person with a very venerable aspect. At the appearance of them the people, who were gathered round me in great multitudes, divided into parties, as they were disposed to favour either of those reverend persons. The enemies of one of them begged me to touch him with my wand, and assured me I should see his lawn converted into a cloak. The opposite party told me with as much assurance, that if I laid my wand upon the other, I should see his garments embroidered with flower-de-luces, and his head covered with a cardinal's hat. I made the experiment, and, to my great joy, saw them both without any change, distributing their blessings to the people, and praying for those who had reviled them. Is it possible, thought I, that good men, who are so few in number, should be divided among themselves, and give better quarter to the vicious that are in their party, than the most strictly virtuous who are out of it? Are the ties of faction above those of religion ?-I was going on in my soliloquies, but some sudden accident awakened me, when I found my hand grasped, but my spear gone. The reflection on so very odd a dream made me figure to myself, what a strange face the world would bear, should all mankind appear in their proper shapes and characters, without hypocrisy and disguise? I am afraid the earth we live upon would appear to other intellectual beings no better than a planet peopled with monsters. This should, methinks, inspire us with an honest ambition of recommending ourselves to those invisible spies, and of being what we would appear. There was one circumstance in my foregoing dream, which I at first intended to conceal; but, upon second thoughts, I cannot look upon myself as a candid and impartial historian, if I do not acquaint my reader, that upon taking Ithuriel's spear into my hand, though I was before an old decrepit fellow, I appeared a very handsome, jolly, black man. But I know my enemies will say this is praising my own beauty, for which reason I The first person that passed by me, was a lady that had a particular shyness in the cast of her eye, and a more than ordinary reservedness in all the parts of her behaviour. She seemed to look upon man as an obscene creature, with a certain scorn and fear of him. In the height of her airs I touched her gently with my wand, when, to my unspeakable surprise, she fell in such a manner as made me blush in my sleep. As I was hasting away from this undisguised prude, I saw a lady in earnest discourse with another, and overheard her say, with some vehemence, Never tell me of him, for I am resolved to die a virgin! I had a curiosity to try her; but, as soon as I laid my wand upon her head, she immediately fell in labour. My eyes were diverted from her by a man and his wife, who walked near me hand in hand after a very loving manner. I gave each of them a gentle tap, and the next instant saw the woman in breeches, and the man with a fan in his hand. It would be tedious to describe the long series of metamorphoses that I entertained myself with in my night's adventure, of whigs disguised in tories, and tories in whigs; men in red coats, that denounced terror in their countenances, trembling at the touch of my spear; others in black, with peace in their mouths, but swords in their hands. I could tell stories of noblemen changed into usurers, and magistrates into beadles; of free-thinkers into penitents, and reformers into whore-masters. I must not, however, omit the mention of a grave citizen who passed by me with a huge clasped bible under his arm, and a band of a most immoderate breadth; but, upon a touch on the shoul-will speak no more of it. der, he let drop his book, and fell a-picking my pocket. In the general I observed, that those who appeared good, often disappointed my expecta. tions; but that, on the contrary, those who appeared very bad, still grew worse upon the experiment; as the toad in Milton, which one would have thought the most deformed part of the creation, at Ithuriel's stroke became more deformed, and started up into a devil. Among all the persons that I touched, there was but one who stood the test of my wand; and, after many repetitions of the stroke, stuck to his form, and remained steady and fixed in his first appearance. This was a young man, who boasted of foul distempers, wild debauches, insults upon holy men, and affronts to religion. My heart was extremely troubled at this vision. The contemplation of the whole species, so entirely sunk in corruption, filled my mind with a melancholy that is inexpressible, and my discoveries still added to my affliction. In the midst of these sorrows which I had in my heart, methought there passed by me a No. 238.] Tuesday, October 17, 1710. Tempestus- From my own Apartment, October 16. STORMS at sea are so frequently described by the ancient poets, and copied by the moderns, that whenever I find the winds begin to rise in a new heroic poem, I generally skip a leaf or two until I come into fair weather. Virgil's tempest is a master-piece in this kind, and is indeed so naturally drawn, that one who has made a voyage can scarce read it without being sea-sick. Land-showers are no less frequent among the poets than the former, but I remem ber none of them which have not fallen in the country; for which reason they are generally filled with the lowings of oxen, and the bleat ings of sheep, and very often embellished with a rainbow. Virgil's land-shower is likewise the best in its kind. It is indeed a shower of consequence, and contributes to the main design of the poein, by cutting off a tedious ceremonial, and bringing matters to a speedy conclusion between two potentates of different sexes. My ingenious kinsman, Mr. Humphrey Wagstaff, who treats of every subject after a manner that no other author has done, and better than any other can do, has sent me the description of a city-shower. I do not question but the reader remembers my cousin's description of the morning as it breaks in town, which is printed in the ninth Tatler, and is another exquisite piece of this local poetry. Careful observers may foretell the hour Not yet the dust had shunn'd th' unequal strife, Altered, when Pope published the Miscellanies, thus: 'Sole coat; where dust cemented by the rain Erects the nap, and leaves a cloudy stain.' Written in the first year of the earl of Oxford's mi. nistry. From my own Apartment, October 18. It is ridiculous for any man to criticise on the works of another, who has not distinguished himself by his own performances. A judge would make but an indifferent figure who had never been known at the bar. Cicero was reputed the greatest orator of his age and country, before he wrote a book De Oratore;' and Horace the greatest poet, before he published his Art of Poetry.' This observation arises naturally in any one who casts his eye upon this last-mentioned author, where he will find the criticisms placed in the latter end of his book, that is, after the finest odes and satires in the Latin tongue. A modern, whose name I shall not mention, because I would not make a silly paper sell, was born a Critic and an Examiner, and, like one of the race of the serpent's teeth, came into the world with a sword in his hand. His works put me in mind of the story that is told of the German monk, who was taking a catalogue of a friend's library, and, meeting with a Hebrew book in it, entered it under the title of, A book that has the beginning where the end should be.' This author, in the last of his crudities, has amassed together a heap of quotations, to prove that Horace and Virgil were both of them modester men than myself; and if his works were to live as long as mine, they might possibly give posterity a notion, that Isaac Bickerstaff was a very conceited old fellow, and as vain a man as either Tully or sir Francis Bacon. Had this serious writer fallen upon me only, I could have overlooked it; but to see Cicero abused is, I must I confess, what I cannot bear. The censure he passes upon this great man runs thus, The itch of being very abusive is almost inseparable from vain-glory. Tully has these two faults in so high a degree, that nothing but his being the best writer in the world can make amends for them.' The scurrilous wretch goes on to say, that I am as bad as Tully. His words are these: And yet the Tatler, in his paper of September the twenty-sixth, has outdone him in both. speaks of himself with more arrogance, and with more insolence of others.' I am afraid, by his discourse, this gentleman has no more read Plutarch than he has Tully. If he had, he would have observed a passage in that historian, wherein he has, with great delicacy, distinguished between two passions which are usually complicated in human nature, and which an ordinary He *These three last lines were intended to ridicule the practice of modern poets, who make three lines rhyme together, which they call triplets, and the last line, two or more syllables longer than the rest, which they call an Alexandrine. What poem can be safe from this sort of criticism? I think I was never in my life so much offended, as at a wag whom I once met with in a coffee-house. He had in his hand one of the Miscellanies,' and was reading the following short copy of verses, which, without flattery to the author, is, I think, as beautiful in its kind as any one in the English tongue!* writer would not have thought of separating. | thing, and nothing. He bestows increase, conNot having my Greek spectacles by me, I shall ceals his source, makes the machine move, quote the passage word for word as I find it teaches to steer, expiates our offences, raises va translated to my hand. Nevertheless, though pours, and looks larger as he sets.' he was intemperately fond of his own praise, yet he was very free from envying others, and most liberally profuse in commending both the ancients and his contemporaries, as is to be understood by his writings; and many of those sayings are still recorded, as that concerning Aristotle," that he was a river of flowing gold:" of Plato's dialogue, "that if Jupiter were to speak, he would discourse as he did." Theophrastus he was wont to call his peculiar delight; and being asked, "which of Demosthenes his orations he liked best?" He answered," The longest." And as for the eminent men of his own time, either for eloquence or philosophy, there was not one of them which he did not, by writing or speaking favourably of, render more illustrious.' Thus the critic tells us, that Cicero was excessively vain-glorious and abusive; Plutarch, that he was vain, but not abusive. Let the reader believe which of them he pleases. After this he complains to the world, that I call him names, and that, in my passion, I said he was a flea, a louse, an owl, a bat, a small wit, a scribbler, and a nibbler. When he has thus bespoken his reader's pity, he falls into that admirable vein of mirth, which I shall set down at length, it being an exquisite piece of raillery, and written in great gayety of heart. After this list of names,' viz. flea, louse, owl, bat, &c. I was surprised to hear him say, that he has hitherto kept his temper pretty well; I wonder how he will write when he has lost his temper! I suppose, as he is now very angry and unmannerly, he will then be exceeding courteous and good-humoured.' If I can outlive this raillery, I shall be able to bear any thing. There is a method of criticism made use of by this author, for I shall take care how I call him a scribbler again which may turn into ridicule any work that was ever written, wherein there is a variety of thoughts. This the reader will observe in the following words: 'He,' meaning me, is so intent upon being something extraordinary, that he scarce knows what he would be; and is as fruitful in his similes as a brother of his whom I lately took notice of.. In the compass of a few lines he compares himself to a fox, to Daniel Burgess, to the Knight of the Red Cross, to an oak with ivy about it, and to a great man with an equipage.' I think myself as much honoured by being joined in this part of his paper with the gentleman whom he here calls my brother, as I am in the beginning of it, by being mentioned with Horace and Virgil. It is very hard that a man cannot publish ten papers without stealing from himself; but to show you that this is only a knack of writing, and that the author has got into a certain road of criticism, I shall set down his remarks on the works of the gentleman whom he here glances upon, as they stand in his sixth paper, and desire the reader to compare them with the foregoing passage upon mine. In thirty lines his patron is a river, the primum mobile, a pilot, a victim, the sun, any Flavia the least and slightest toy When this coxcomb had done reading them, 'Hey-day! says he, what instrument is this that Flavia employs in such a manner as is not to be told, nor safely seen? In ten lines it is a toy, a cupid's bow, a fan, and an engine in love. It has wanton motions, it wounds, it cools, and inflames.' Such criticisms make a man of sense sick, and a fool merry. The next paragraph of the paper we are talking of, falls upon some body whom I am at a loss to guess at: but I find the whole invective turns upon a man who, it seems, has been imprisoned for debt. Whoever he was, I most heartily pity him; but at the same time must put the examiner in mind, that notwithstanding he is a critic, he still ought to remem ber he is a Christian. Poverty was never thought a proper subject for ridicule; and I do not remember that I ever met with a satire upon a beggar. As for those little retortings of my own ex pressions, of being dull by design, witty in October, shining, excelling, and so forth; they are the common cavils of every witling, who has no other method of showing his parts, but by little variations and repetitions of the man's words whom he attacks. But the truth of it is, the paper before me, not only in this particular, but in its very es sence, is like Ovid's Echo, -Que nec reticere loquenti, Nec prior ipsa loqui didicit-Orid. Met. iii. 357. I should not have deserved the character of a Censor, had I not animadverted upon the abovementioned author, by a gentle chastisement: but I know my reader will not pardon me, un. less I declare, that nothing of this nature for the future, unless it be written with some wit, shall divert me from my care of the public. Dr. Atterbury was the author of this copy of verses; and it has been commonly believed, that Mrs. Anne Oldfield was the lady here celebrated. Saturday, October 21, 1710. No. 210.] Ad populum phaleras.- Pers. Sat. iii. 30. Such pageantry be to the people shown: From my own Apartment, October 20. born to a halfpenny. died twice as long by day-light, and never have been taken notice of. But lucubrations cannot be overvalued. There are some who have gained themselves great reputation for physic by their birth, as the seventh son of a seventh son;' and others by not being born at all, as the unborn doctor, who, I hear, is lately gone the way of his patients; having died worth five I Do not remember that in any of my lucu-hundred pounds per annum, though he was not brations I have touched upon that useful science of physic, notwithstanding I have declared myself more than once a professor of it. I have indeed joined the study of astrology with it, because I never knew a physician recommend himself to the public, who had not a sister art to embellish his knowledge in medicine. It has been commonly observed, in compliment to the ingenious of our profession, that Apollo was god of verse as well as physic; and, in all ages, the most celebrated practitioners of our country were the particular favourites of the muses. Poetry to physic is indeed like the gilding to a pill; it makes the art shine, and covers the severity of the doctor with the agreeableness of the companion. The very foundation of poetry is good sense, if we may allow Horace to be a judge of the art. Scribendi recte sapere est et principium et fons. And if so, we have reason to believe, that the same man who writes well can prescribe well, if he has applied himself to the study of both. Besides, when we see a man making profession of two different sciences, it is natural for us to believe he is no pretender in that which we are not judges of, when we find him skilful in that which we understand. My ingenious friend doctor Saffold succeeded my old contemporary doctor Lilly, in the studies both of physic and astrology, to which he added that of poetry, as was to be seen both upon the sign where he lived, and in the bills which he distributed. He was succeeded by doctor Case, who erased the verses of his predecessor out of the sign post, and substituted in their place two of his own, which were as follow: Within this place than Mr. Dryden did by all his works. There He is said to have got more by this distich, imaginary perfections, and unaccountable artiwould be no end of enumerating the several fices, by which this tribe of men ensnare the minds of the vulgar, and gain crowds of admirers. I have seen the whole front of a nountebank's stage, from one end to the other, faced with patents, certificates, medals, and great seals, by which the several princes of Europe have testified their particular respect and esteem for the doctor. Every great man with a sounding title has been his patient. I believe I have seen twenty mountebanks that have given physic to the czar of Muscovy. The great duke of Tuscany escapes no better. The elector of Brandenburg was likewise a very good patient. This great condescension of the doctor draws Ordinary quacks and charlatans are thorough- upon him much good will from his audience; ly sensible how necessary it is to support them- and it is ten to one, but if any of them be selves by these collateral assistances, and there- troubled with an aching tooth, his ambition will fore always lay their claims to some supernu-prompt him to get it drawn by a person who merary accomplishments, which are wholly foreign to their profession. has had so many princes, kings, and emperors, under his hands. About twenty years ago it was impossible to I must not leave this subject without obwalk the streets without having an advertise- serving, that as physicians are apt to deal in ment thrust into your hand, of a doctor, who poetry, apothecaries endeavour to recommend had arrived at the knowledge of the green and themselves by oratory, and are, therefore, withred dragon, and had discovered the female fern-out controversy, the most eloquent persons in seed.' Nobody ever knew what this meant; but the whole British nation. I would not willingly the green and red dragon so amused the people, that the doctor lived very comfortably upon them. About the same time there was pasted a very hard word upon every corner of the streets. This, to the best of my remembrance, was, TETRACHYMAGOGON, which drew great shoals of spectators about it, who read the bill that it introduced with unspeakable curiosity; and, when they were sick, would have nobody but this learned man for their physician. I once received an advertisement of one who had studied thirty years by candle-light for the good of his countrymen.' He might have stu discourage any of the arts, especially that of which I am an humble professor; but I must confess, for the good of my native country, I could wish there might be a suspension of physic for some years, that our kingdom, which has been so much exhausted by the wars, might have leave to recruit itself. As for myself, the only physic which has brought me safe to almost the age of man, and which I prescribe to all my friends, is abstinence. This is certainly the best physic for prevention, and very often the most effectual against a present distemper. In short, my recipe is, 'take nothing.' Were the body politic to be physicked like particular persons, I should venture to prescribe |