My Lord,
Very many Favours and Civilities (received from You in a private
Capacity) which I have no other Way to acknowledge, will, I hope, excuse
this Presumption; but the Justice I, as a Spectator, owe your Character,
places me above the want of an Excuse. Candor and Openness of Heart,
which shine in all your Words and Actions, exacts the highest Esteem
from all who have the Honour to know You, and a winning Condescention to
all subordinate to You, made Business a Pleasure to those who executed
it under You, at the same time that it heightened Her Majesty's Favour
to all who had the Happiness of having it convey'd through Your Hands: A
Secretary of State, in the Interests of Mankind, joined with that of his
Fellow-Subjects, accomplished with a great Facility and Elegance in all
the Modern as well as Ancient Languages, was a happy and proper Member
of a Ministry, by whose Services Your Sovereign and Country are in so
high and flourishing a Condition, as makes all other Princes and
Potentates powerful or inconsiderable in Europe, as they are Friends or
Enemies to Great-Britain. The Importance of those great Events which
happened during that Administration, in which Your Lordship bore so
important a Charge, will be acknowledgd as long as Time shall endure; I
shall not therefore attempt to rehearse those illustrious Passages, but
give this Application a more private and particular Turn, in desiring
Your Lordship would continue your Favour and Patronage to me, as You are
a Gentleman of the most polite Literature, and perfectly accomplished in
the Knowledge of Books and Men, which makes it necessary to beseech Your
Indulgence to the following Leaves, and the Author of them: Who is, with
the greatest Truth and Respect,
My Lord,
Your Lordship's Obliged,
Obedient, and Humble Servant,
THE SPECTATOR.
[Footnote 1: Charles Spencer, to whom the Sixth Volume of the Spectator
is here inscribed, represented Tiverton, in 1700, when he took the Lady
Anne Churchill, Marlborough's second daughter, for his second wife. On
the death of his father Robert, in 1702, he became Earl of Sunderland.
He was an accomplished man and founder of the library at Althorpe. In
1705 he was employed diplomatically at the courts of Prussia, Austria,
and Hanover. Early in 1706 he was one of the Commissioners for arranging
the Union with Scotland, and in September of that year he was forced by
the Whigs on Queen Anne, as successor to Sir Charles Hedges in the
office of Secretary of State. Steele held under him the office of
Gazetteer, to which he was appointed in the following May. In 1710
Sunderland shared in the political reverse suffered by Marlborough. In
the summer of that year Sunderland was dismissed from office, but with
an offer from the Queen of a pension of £3000 a year. He replied that he
was glad her Majesty was satisfied that he had done his duty; but if he
could not have the honour to serve his country, he would not plunder it.
The accession of George I. restored him to favour and influence. He
became Lord-lieutenant of Ireland; had, in 1715, a pension of £12,000 a
year settled on him; in April, 1717, was again Secretary of State; and
in the following March, Lord President of the Council. His political
influence was broken in 1721, the year before his death.]
* * * * *
No. 395. Tuesday, June 3, 1712. Budgell.
'Quod nunc ratio est, Impetus ante fuit.'
Ovid.
Beware of the Ides of March, said the Roman Augur to Julius Cæsar:
Beware of the Month of May, says the British Spectator to his fair
Country-women. The Caution of the first was unhappily neglected, and
Cæsar's Confidence cost him his Life. I am apt to flatter my self that
my pretty Readers had much more regard to the Advice I gave them, since
I have yet received very few Accounts of any notorious Trips made in the
last Month.
But tho' I hope for the best, I shall not pronounce too positively on
this point, till I have seen forty Weeks well over, at which Period of
Time, as my good Friend Sir ROGER has often told me, he has more
Business as a Justice of Peace, among the dissolute young People in the
Country, than at any other Season of the Year.
Neither must I forget a Letter which I received near a Fortnight since
from a Lady, who, it seems, could hold out no longer, telling me she
looked upon the Month as then out, for that she had all along reckoned
by the New Style.
On the other hand, I have great reason to believe, from several angry
Letters which have been sent to me by disappointed Lovers, that my
Advice has been of very signal Service to the fair Sex, who, according
to the old Proverb, were Forewarned forearm'd.
One of these Gentlemen tells me, that he would have given me an hundred
Pounds, rather than I should have publishd that Paper; for that his
Mistress, who had promised to explain herself to him about the Beginning
of May, upon reading that Discourse told him that she would give him her
Answer in June.
Thyrsis acquaints me, that when he desired Sylvia to take a Walk in the
Fields, she told him the Spectator had forbidden her.
Another of my Correspondents, who writes himself Mat Meager, complains,
that whereas he constantly used to Breakfast with his Mistress upon
Chocolate, going to wait upon her the first of May he found his usual
Treat very much changed for the worse, and has been forced to feed ever
since upon Green Tea.
As I begun this Critical Season with a Caveat to the Ladies, I shall
conclude it with a Congratulation, and do most heartily wish them Joy of
their happy Deliverance.
They may now reflect with Pleasure on the Dangers they have escaped, and
look back with as much Satisfaction on their Perils that threat'ned
them, as their Great-Grandmothers did formerly on the Burning
Plough-shares, after having passed through the Ordeal Tryal. The
Instigations of the Spring are now abated. The Nightingale gives over
her Love-labourd Song, as Milton phrases it, the Blossoms are fallen,
and the Beds of Flowers swept away by the Scythe of the Mower.
I shall now allow my Fair Readers to return to their Romances and
Chocolate, provided they make use of them with Moderation, till about
the middle of the Month, when the Sun shall have made some Progress in
the Crab. Nothing is more dangerous, than too much Confidence and
Security. The Trojans, who stood upon their Guard all the while the
Grecians lay before their City, when they fancied the Siege was raised,
and the Danger past, were the very next Night burnt in their Beds: I
must also observe, that as in some Climates there is a perpetual Spring,
so in some Female Constitutions there is a perpetual May: These are a
kind of Valetudinarians in Chastity, whom I would continue in a constant
Diet. I cannot think these wholly out of Danger, till they have looked
upon the other Sex at least Five Years through a Pair of Spectacles.
WILL. HONEYCOMB has often assured me, that its much easier to steal one
of this Species, when she has passed her grand Climacterick, than to
carry off an icy Girl on this side Five and Twenty; and that a Rake of
his Acquaintance, who had in vain endeavoured to gain the Affections of
a young Lady of Fifteen, had at last made his Fortune by running away
with her Grandmother.
But as I do not design this Speculation for the Evergreens of the Sex, I
shall again apply my self to those who would willingly listen to the
Dictates of Reason and Virtue, and can now hear me in cold Blood. If
there are any who have forfeited their Innocence, they must now consider
themselves under that Melancholy View, in which Chamont regards his
Sister, in those beautiful Lines.
--Long she flourish'd,
Grew sweet to Sense, and lovely to the Eye;
Till at the last a cruel Spoiler came,
Cropt this fair Rose, and rifled all its Sweetness;
Then cast it like a loathsome Weed away. [1]
On the contrary, she who has observed the timely Cautions I gave her,
and lived up to the Rules of Modesty, will now Flourish like a Rose in
June, with all her Virgin Blushes and Sweetness about her: I must,
however, desire these last to consider, how shameful it would be for a
General, who has made a Successful Campaign, to be surprized in his
Winter Quarters: It would be no less dishonourable for a Lady to lose in
any other Month of the Year, what she has been at the pains to preserve
in May.
There is no Charm in the Female Sex, that can supply the place of
Virtue. Without Innocence, Beauty is unlovely, and Quality contemptible,
Good-breeding degenerates into Wantonness, and Wit into Impudence. It is
observed, that all the Virtues are represented by both Painters and
Statuaries under Female Shapes, but if any one of them has a more
particular Title to that Sex, it is Modesty. I shall leave it to the
Divines to guard them against the opposite Vice, as they may be
overpowerd by Temptations; It is sufficient for me to have warned them
against it, as they may be led astray by Instinct.
I desire this Paper may be read with more than ordinary Attention, at
all Tea-Tables within the Cities of London and Westminster.