[225] In the list which he gave to Tickell, Steele describes this
paper as written by Addison and himself jointly. Hawkesworth claimed
for Swift Nos. 66, 67, 74, and 81, and no doubt the idea of "tables
of fame" (No. 67) was started by him. On October 8, Steele wrote to
Swift: "I wonder you do not write sometimes to me. The town is in
great expectation from Bickerstaff; what passed at the election for
the first table being to be published this day seven-night. I have not
seen Ben Tooke a great while, but long to usher you and yours into the
world." But it seems clear that Swift left his friends to carry out
the execution of the plan. As Nichols points out, Swift afterwards
wrote: "I was told that Brutus, and his ancestor Junius, Socrates,
Epaminondas, Cato the younger, and Sir Thomas More, were perpetually
together: a sextumvirate, to which all the ages of the world cannot add
a seventh." Now there are only _two_ of this sextumvirate admitted to
seats at the first "table of fame" in the _Tatler_. There are besides,
in this paper, manifest deviations from the plan proposed in No. 67,
and palpable contradictions to it. The "side-table" is here forgotten;
the heroes of "great fame but dubious existence" are turned into a
separate apartment; the number of the company at the second table is
reduced from twenty to twelve; Bickerstaff, who "had not been dead an
hundred years," is mentioned to make out the dozen; of the third table
there is nothing said; and the subject seems finally discussed in one
paper, which was evidently intended to have made three.
[226] The annotators of the 1786 edition devoted a very long note to
the defence of Pythagoras against what is here said of him. As to his
"harlotry," he clearly could not be responsible for the metamorphoses
of his soul after death. His soul continued, it was said, to shift its
habitations; and Dicearchus, almost a whole century after the death
of Socrates, related, that on its third removal, it got into the body
of Alce, a beautiful courtesan. (Aul. Gell., "Noct. Att.," IV. xi.)
Lucian, long after, taking a century posterior to Pythagoras, makes his
soul animate the body of Aspasia, the mistress of Pericles.
[227] Archimedes ordered a sphere included in a cylinder, the diagram
of his thirty-second proposition, to be erected upon his tomb. This
figure was accordingly carved upon a stone near one of the gates
of Syracuse, and became the means of enabling Cicero to discover
the sepulchre of Archimedes, covered over with brambles and thorns.
(Cicero, "Disp. Tusc.," v. 23.)
No. 82. [STEELE.
From _Saturday, Oct. 15_, to _Tuesday, Oct. 18, 1709_.
Ubiidem et maximus et honestissimus amor est, aliquando præstat
morte jungi, quam vitâ distrahi.--VAL. MAX.
_From my own Apartment, October 17._
After the mind has been employed on contemplations suitable to its
greatness, it is unnatural to run into sudden mirth or levity; but
we must let the soul subside as it rose, by proper degrees. My late
considerations of the ancient heroes impressed a certain gravity upon
my mind, which is much above the little gratification received from
starts of humour and fancy, and threw me into a pleasing sadness. In
this state of thought I have been looking at the fire, and in a pensive
manner reflecting upon the great misfortunes and calamities incident
to human life; among which, there are none that touch so sensibly, as
those which befall persons who eminently love, and meet with fatal
interruptions of their happiness when they least expect it. The piety
of children to parents, and the affection of parents to their children,
are the effects of instinct; but the affection between lovers and
friends is founded on reason and choice, which has always made me
think, the sorrows of the latter much more to be pitied than those of
the former. The contemplation of distresses of this sort softens the
mind of man, and makes the heart better. It extinguishes the seeds of
envy and ill-will towards mankind, corrects the pride of prosperity,
and beats down all that fierceness and insolence which are apt to get
into the minds of the daring and fortunate. For this reason the wise
Athenians, in their theatrical performances, laid before the eyes of
the people the greatest afflictions which could befall human life,
and insensibly polished their tempers by such representations. Among
the modern, indeed there has arisen a chimerical method of disposing
the fortune of the persons represented, according to what they call
poetical justice; and letting none be unhappy, but those who deserve
it. In such cases, an intelligent spectator, if he is concerned, knows
he ought not to be so; and can learn nothing from such a tenderness,
but that he is a weak creature, whose passions cannot follow the
dictates of his understanding. It is very natural, when one is got into
such a way of thinking, to recollect those examples of sorrow which
have made the strongest impression upon our imaginations. An instance
or two of such you will give me leave to communicate.
A young gentleman and lady of ancient and honourable houses in Cornwall
had from their childhood entertained for each other a generous and
noble passion, which had been long opposed by their friends, by reason
of the inequality of their fortunes; but their constancy to each other,
and obedience to those on whom they depended, wrought so much upon
their relations, that these celebrated lovers were at length joined in
marriage. Soon after their nuptials, the bridegroom was obliged to go
into a foreign country, to take care of a considerable fortune which
was left him by a relation, and came very opportunely to improve their
moderate circumstances. They received the congratulations of all the
country on this occasion; and I remember it was a common sentence in
every one's mouth, "You see how faithful love is rewarded."
He took this agreeable voyage, and sent home every post fresh accounts
of his success in his affairs abroad; but at last (though he designed
to return with the next ship) he lamented in his letters, that business
would detain him some time longer from home, because he would give
himself the pleasure of an unexpected arrival.
The young lady, after the heat of the day, walked every evening on the
seashore, near which she lived, with a familiar friend, her husband's
kinswoman, and diverted herself with what objects they met there, or
upon discourses of the future methods of life in the happy change of
their circumstances. They stood one evening on the shore together in a
perfect tranquillity, observing the setting of the sun, the calm face
of the deep, and the silent heaving of the waves, which gently rolled
towards them, and broke at their feet; when at a distance her kinswoman
saw something float on the waters, which she fancied was a chest; and
with a smile told her, she saw it first, and if it came ashore full of
jewels, she had a right to it. They both fixed their eyes upon it, and
entertained themselves with the subject of the wreck, the cousin still
asserting her right; but promising, if it was a prize, to give her a
very rich coral for the child of which she was then big, provided she
might be god-mother. Their mirth soon abated, when they observed upon
the nearer approach, that it was a human body. The young lady, who had
a heart naturally filled with pity and compassion, made many melancholy
reflections on the occasion. "Who knows," said she, "but this man may
be the only hope and heir of a wealthy house; the darling of indulgent
parents, who are now in impertinent mirth, and pleasing themselves
with the thoughts of offering him a bride they have got ready for him?
Or may he not be the master of a family that wholly depended upon
his life? There may, for aught we know, be half-a-dozen fatherless
children, and a tender wife, now exposed to poverty by his death. What
pleasure might he have promised himself in the different welcome he was
to have from her and them? But let us go away, it is a dreadful sight!
The best office we can do, is to take care that the poor man, whoever
he is, may be decently buried." She turned away, when a wave threw the
carcass on the shore. The kinswoman immediately shrieked out, "Oh, my
cousin!" and fell upon the ground. The unhappy wife went to help her
friend, when she saw her own husband at her feet, and dropped in a
swoon upon the body. An old woman, who had been the gentleman's nurse,
came out about this time to call the ladies in to supper, and found her
child (as she always called him) dead on the shore, her mistress and
kinswoman both lying dead by him. Her loud lamentations, and calling
her young master to life, soon awaked the friend from her trance; but
the wife was gone for ever.
When the family and neighbourhood got together round the bodies, no one
asked any question, but the objects before them told the story.[230]
Incidents of this nature are the more moving when they are drawn by
persons concerned in the catastrophe, notwithstanding they are often
oppressed beyond the power of giving them in a distinct light, except
we gather their sorrow from their inability to speak it. I have
two original letters written both on the same day, which are to me
exquisite in their different kinds. The occasion was this: a young
gentleman who had courted a most agreeable young woman, and won her
heart, obtained also the consent of her father, to whom she was an only
child. The old man had a fancy that they should be married in the same
church where he himself was, in a village in Westmorland, and made them
set out while he was laid up with the gout at London. The bridegroom
took only his man, the bride her maid. They had the most agreeable
journey imaginable to the place of marriage: from whence the bridegroom
wrote the following letter to his wife's father:--
"SIR,
_March 18, 1672._
"After a very pleasant journey hither, we are preparing for the
happy hour in which I am to be your son. I assure you the bride
carries it, in the eye of the vicar who married you, much beyond
her mother; though he says, your open sleeves, pantaloons, and
shoulder-knot made a much better show than the finical dress I am
in. However, I am contented to be the second fine man this village
ever saw, and shall make it very merry before night, because I
shall write myself from thence,
"Your most dutiful Son,
T. D."
"The bride gives her duty, and is as handsome as an angel--I am
the happiest man breathing."
The villagers were assembling about the church, and the happy couple
took a walk in a private garden. The bridegroom's man knew his master
would leave the place on a sudden after the wedding, and seeing him
draw his pistols the night before, took this opportunity to go into
his chamber and charge them. Upon their return from the garden, they
went into that room; and after a little fond raillery on the subject
of their courtship, the lover took up a pistol which he knew he had
unloaded the night before, and presenting it to her, said with the most
graceful air, whilst she looked pleased at his agreeable flattery,
"Now, madam, repent of all those cruelties you have been guilty of to
me; consider before you die, how often you have made a poor wretch
freeze under your casement;[231] you shall die, you tyrant, you shall
die, with all those instruments of death and destruction about you,
with that enchanting smile, those killing ringlets of your hair"--"Give
fire," said she, laughing. He did so, and shot her dead. Who can speak
his condition? But he bore it so patiently as to call up his man. The
poor wretch entered, and his master locked the door upon him. "Well,"
said he, "did you charge these pistols?" He answered, "Yes." Upon which
he shot him dead with that remaining. After this, amidst a thousand
broken sobs, piercing groans, and distracted motions, he wrote the
following letter to the father of his dead mistress:--
"SIR,
"I, who two hours ago told you truly I was the happiest man
alive, am now the most miserable. Your daughter lies dead at my
feet, killed by my hand, through a mistake of my man's charging
my pistols unknown to me. Him I have murdered for it. Such is my
wedding-day,--I will immediately follow my wife to her grave: but
before I throw myself upon my sword, I command my distraction so
far as to explain my story to you. I fear my heart will not keep
together till I have stabbed it. Poor good old man!--Remember, he
that killed your daughter, died for it. In the article of death
I give you my thanks, and pray for you, though I dare not for
myself. If it be possible, do not curse me."