As it is natural for every man to think himself of importance, your
knowledge of the world will incline you to forgive me, if I imagine your
curiosity so much excited by the former part of my narration, as to
make you desire that I should proceed without any unnecessary arts of
connexion. I shall, therefore, not keep you longer in such suspense,
as perhaps my performance may not compensate.
In the gay company with which I was now united, I found those
allurements and delights, which the friendship of young men always
affords; there was that openness which naturally produced confidence,
that affability which, in some measure, softened dependance, and that
ardour of profession which incited hope. When our hearts were dilated
with merriment, promises were poured out with unlimited profusion, and
life and fortune were but a scanty sacrifice to friendship; but when the
hour came, at which any effort was to be made, I had generally the
vexation to find that my interest weighed nothing against the slightest
amusement, and that every petty avocation was found a sufficient plea
for continuing me in uncertainty and want.
Their kindness was indeed sincere; when they promised, they had no
intention to deceive; but the same juvenile warmth which kindled their
benevolence, gave force in the same proportion to every other passion,
and I was forgotten as soon as any new pleasures seized on their
attention.
Vagario told me one evening, that all my perplexities should be soon at
an end, and desired me, from that instant, to throw upon him all care of
my fortune, for a post of considerable value was that day become vacant,
and he knew his interest sufficient to procure it in the morning. He
desired me to call on him early, that he might be dressed soon enough to
wait on the minister before any other application should be made. I came
as he appointed, with all the flame of gratitude, and was told by his
servant, that having found at his lodgings, when he came home, an
acquaintance who was going to travel, he had been persuaded to accompany
him to Dover, and that they had taken post-horses two hours before day.
I was once very near to preferment, by the kindness of Charinus, who, at
my request, went to beg a place, which he thought me likely to fill with
great reputation, and in which I should have many opportunities of
promoting his interest in return; and he pleased himself with imagining
the mutual benefits that we should confer, and the advances that we
should make by our united strength. Away therefore he went, equally warm
with friendship and ambition, and left me to prepare acknowledgments
against his return. At length he came back, and told me that he had met
in his way a party going to breakfast in the country, that the ladies
importuned him too much to be refused, and that having passed the
morning with them, he was come back to dress himself for a ball, to
which he was invited for the evening.
I have suffered several disappointments from tailors and periwig-makers,
who, by neglecting to perform their work, withheld my patrons from court;
and once failed of an establishment for life by the delay of a servant,
sent to a neighbouring shop to replenish a snuff-box.
At last I thought my solicitude at an end, for an office fell into the
gift of Hippodamus's father, who being then in the country, could not
very speedily fill it, and whose fondness would not have suffered him to
refuse his son a less reasonable request. Hippodamus therefore set
forward with great expedition, and I expected every hour an account of
his success. A long time I waited without any intelligence, but at last
received a letter from Newmarket, by which I was informed that the races
were begun, and I knew the vehemence of his passions too well to imagine
that he could refuse himself his favourite amusement.
You will not wonder that I was at last weary of the patronage of young
men, especially as I found them not generally to promise much greater
fidelity as they advanced in life; for I observed that what they gained
in steadiness they lost in benevolence, and grew colder to my interest
as they became more diligent to promote their own. I was convinced that
their liberality was only profuseness, that as chance directed, they
were equally generous to vice and virtue, that they were warm but
because they were thoughtless, and counted the support of a friend only
amongst other gratifications of passion.
My resolution was now to ingratiate myself with men whose reputation was
established, whose high stations enabled them to prefer me, and whose
age exempted them from sudden changes of inclination. I was considered
as a man of parts, and therefore easily found admission to the table of
Hilarius, the celebrated orator, renowned equally for the extent of his
knowledge, the elegance of his diction, and the acuteness of his wit.
Hilarius received me with an appearance of great satisfaction, produced
to me all his friends, and directed to me that part of his discourse in
which he most endeavoured to display his imagination. I had now learned
my own interest enough to supply him opportunities for smart remarks and
gay sallies, which I never failed to echo and applaud. Thus I was gaining
every hour on his affections, till unfortunately, when the assembly was
more splendid than usual, his desire of admiration prompted him to turn
his raillery upon me. I bore it for some time with great submission,
and success encouraged him to redouble his attacks; at last my vanity
prevailed over my prudence, I retorted his irony with such spirit, that
Hilarius, unaccustomed to resistance, was disconcerted, and soon found
means of convincing me that his purpose was not to encourage a rival,
but to foster a parasite.
I was then taken into the familiarity of Argutio, a nobleman eminent
for judgment and criticism. He had contributed to my reputation by the
praises which he had often bestowed upon my writings, in which he owned
that there were proofs of a genius that might rise to high degrees of
excellence, when time, or information, had reduced its exuberance. He
therefore required me to consult him before the publication of any new
performance, and commonly proposed innumerable alterations, without
sufficient attention to the general design, or regard to my form of
style, and mode of imagination. But these corrections he never failed
to press as indispensably necessary, and thought the least delay of
compliance an act of rebellion. The pride of an author made this
treatment insufferable, and I thought any tyranny easier to be borne
than that which took from me the use of my understanding.
My next patron was Eutyches, the statesman, who was wholly engaged in
public affairs, and seemed to have no ambition but to be powerful and
rich, I found his favour more permanent than that of the others; for
there was a certain price at which it might be bought; he allowed
nothing to humour, or to affection, but was always ready to pay
liberally for the service that he required. His demands were, indeed,
very often such as virtue could not easily consent to gratify; but
virtue is not to be consulted when men are to raise their fortunes by
the favour of the great. His measures were censured; I wrote in his
defence, and was recompensed with a place, of which the profits were
never received by me without the pangs of remembering that they were the
reward of wickedness--a reward which nothing but that necessity which
the consumption of my little estate in these wild pursuits had brought
upon me, hindered me from throwing back in the face of my corrupter.
At this time my uncle died without a will, and I became heir to a small
fortune. I had resolution to throw off the splendour which reproached
me to myself, and retire to an humbler state, in which I am now
endeavouring to recover the dignity of virtue, and hope to make some
reparation for my crime and follies, by informing others, who may be
led after the same pageants, that they are about to engage in a course
of life, in which they are to purchase, by a thousand miseries, the
privilege of repentance.