TATE.

In one of my last week's papers, I treated of good-nature as it is the

effect of constitution; I shall now speak of it as it is a moral virtue.

The first may make a man easy in himself and agreeable to others, but

implies no merit in him that is possessed of it. A man is no more to be

praised upon this account, than because he has a regular pulse or a good

digestion. This good nature, however, in the constitution, which Mr.

Dryden somewhere calls "a milkiness of blood," is an admirable groundwork

for the other. In order, therefore, to try our good-nature, whether it

arises from the body or the mind, whether it be founded in the animal or

rational part of our nature; in a word, whether it be such as is entitled

to any other reward besides that secret satisfaction and contentment of

mind which is essential to it, and the kind reception it procures us in

the world, we must examine it by the following rules:

First, whether it acts with steadiness and uniformity in sickness and in

health, in prosperity and in adversity; if otherwise, it is to be looked

upon as nothing else but an irradiation of the mind from some new supply

of spirits, or a more kindly circulation of the blood. Sir Francis Bacon

mentions a cunning solicitor, who would never ask a favour of a great man

before dinner; but took care to prefer his petition at a time when the

party petitioned had his mind free from care, and his appetites in good

humour. Such a transient temporary good-nature as this, is not that

philanthropy, that love of mankind, which deserves the title of a moral

virtue.

The next way of a man's bringing his good-nature to the test is to

consider whether it operates according to the rules of reason and duty:

for if, notwithstanding its general benevolence to mankind, it makes no

distinction between its objects; if it exerts itself promiscuously

towards the deserving and the undeserving; if it relieves alike the idle

and the indigent; if it gives itself up to the first petitioner, and

lights upon any one rather by accident than choice--it may pass for an

amiable instinct, but must not assume the name of a moral virtue.

The third trial of good-nature will be the examining ourselves whether or

no we are able to exert it to our own disadvantage, and employ it on

proper objects, notwithstanding any little pain, want, or inconvenience,

which may arise to ourselves from it: in a word, whether we are willing

to risk any part of our fortune, our reputation, our health or ease, for

the benefit of mankind. Among all these expressions of good nature, I

shall single out that which goes under the general name of charity, as it

consists in relieving the indigent: that being a trial of this kind which

offers itself to us almost at all times and in every place.

I should propose it as a rule, to every one who is provided with any

competency of fortune more than sufficient for the necessaries of life,

to lay aside a certain portion of his income for the use of the poor.

This I would look upon as an offering to Him who has a right to the

whole, for the use of those whom, in the passage hereafter mentioned, He

has described as His own representatives upon earth. At the same time,

we should manage our charity with such prudence and caution, that we may

not hurt our own friends or relations whilst we are doing good to those

who are strangers to us.

This may possibly be explained better by an example than by a rule.

Eugenius is a man of a universal good nature, and generous beyond the

extent of his fortune; but withal so prudent in the economy of his

affairs, that what goes out in charity is made up by good management.

Eugenius has what the world calls two hundred pounds a year; but never

values himself above nine-score, as not thinking he has a right to the

tenth part, which he always appropriates to charitable uses. To this sum

he frequently makes other voluntary additions, insomuch, that in a good

year--for such he accounts those in which he has been able to make

greater bounties than ordinary--he has given above twice that sum to the

sickly and indigent. Eugenius prescribes to himself many particular days

of fasting and abstinence, in order to increase his private bank of

charity, and sets aside what would be the current expenses of those times

for the use of the poor. He often goes afoot where his business calls

him, and at the end of his walk has given a shilling, which in his

ordinary methods of expense would have gone for coach-hire, to the first

necessitous person that has fallen in his way. I have known him, when he

has been going to a play or an opera, divert the money which was designed

for that purpose upon an object of charity whom he has met with in the

street; and afterwards pass his evening in a coffee-house, or at a

friend's fireside, with much greater satisfaction to himself than he

could have received from the most exquisite entertainments of the

theatre. By these means he is generous without impoverishing himself,

and enjoys his estate by making it the property of others.

There are few men so cramped in their private affairs, who may not be

charitable after this manner, without any disadvantage to themselves, or

prejudice to their families. It is but sometimes sacrificing a diversion

or convenience to the poor, and turning the usual course of our expenses

into a better channel. This is, I think, not only the most prudent and

convenient, but the most meritorious piece of charity which we can put in

practice. By this method, we in some measure share the necessities of

the poor at the same time that we relieve them, and make ourselves not

only their patrons, but their fellow-sufferers.

Sir Thomas Brown, in the last part of his "Religio Medici," in which he

describes his charity in several heroic instances, and with a noble heat

of sentiments, mentions that verse in the Proverbs of Solomon: "He that

giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord." There is more rhetoric in that

one sentence, says he, than in a library of sermons; and indeed, if those

sentences were understood by the reader with the same emphasis as they

are delivered by the author, we needed not those volumes of instructions,

but might be honest by an epitome.

This passage of Scripture is, indeed, wonderfully persuasive; but I think

the same thought is carried much further in the New Testament, where our

Saviour tells us, in a most pathetic manner, that he shall hereafter

regard the clothing of the naked, the feeding of the hungry, and the

visiting of the imprisoned, as offices done to Himself, and reward them

accordingly. Pursuant to those passages in Holy Scripture, I have

somewhere met with the epitaph of a charitable man, which has very much

pleased me. I cannot recollect the words, but the sense of it is to this

purpose: What I spent I lost; what I possessed is left to others; what I

gave away remains with me.

Since I am thus insensibly engaged in Sacred Writ, I cannot forbear

making an extract of several passages which I have always read with great

delight in the book of Job. It is the account which that holy man gives

of his behaviour in the days of his prosperity; and, if considered only

as a human composition, is a finer picture of a charitable and

good-natured man than is to be met with in any other author.

"Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me:

When his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked

through darkness: When the Almighty was yet with me; when my children

were about me: When I washed my steps with butter, and the rock poured me

out rivers of oil.

"When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it

gave witness to me. Because I delivered the poor that cried, and the

fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him that

was ready to perish came upon me, and I caused the widow's heart to sing

for joy. I was eyes to the blind; and feet was I to the lame; I was a

father to the poor, and the cause which I knew not I searched out. Did

not I weep for him that was in trouble? Was not my soul grieved for the

poor? Let me be weighed in an even balance, that God may know mine

integrity. If I did despise the cause of my man-servant or of my maid-

servant when they contended with me: What then shall I do when God riseth

up? and when he visiteth, what shall I answer him? Did not he that made

me in the womb, make him? and did not one fashion us in the womb? If I

have withheld the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the

widow to fail; Or have eaten my morsel myself alone, and the fatherless

hath not eaten thereof; If I have seen any perish for want of clothing,

or any poor without covering; If his loins have not blessed me, and if he

were not warmed with the fleece of my sheep; If I have lifted my hand

against the fatherless, when I saw my help in the gate: Then let mine arm

fall from my shoulder-blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone. If I

[have] rejoiced at the destruction of him that hated me, or lifted up

myself when evil found him: Neither have I suffered my mouth to sin, by

wishing a curse to his soul. The stranger did not lodge in the street;

but I opened my doors to the traveller. If my land cry against me, or

that the furrows likewise thereof complain: If I have eaten the fruits

thereof without money, or have caused the owners thereof to lose their

life: Let thistles grow instead of wheat, and cockle instead of barley."