I know very many men will defpife, and fome pity me, for this humour, as a poorfpirited fellow; but I am content, and, like Horace, thank God for being fo.

Di bene fecerunt, inopis me quódque pufilli
Finxerunt animi *.

I confefs, I love littlenefs almoft in all things. A little convenient eftate, a little company, and a very little feaft; and, if I were ever to fall in love again (which is a great paffion, and therefore, I hope, I have done with it) it would be, I think, with prettinefs, rather than with majeftical beauty. I would neither with that my mistress, nor my fortune, should be a bona roba, nor, as Homer ufes to describe his beauties, like a daughter of great Jupiter for the ftateliness and largeness of her person; but as Lucretius fays,

Parvola, pumilio, Xagírwv pía, tota merum fal †.

Where there is one man of this, I believe there are a thoufand of Senecio's mind, whofe ridiculous affectation of grandeur Seneca the eldert describes to this effect: Senecio was a man of a turbid and confufed wit, who could not endure to speak any but mighty words and fentences, till this humour grew at laft into so notorious a habit, or rather difeafe, as became the fport of the whole town he would have no fervants, but huge, maffy fellows; no plate or household-stuff, but thrice as big as the fashion: you may believe me, for I fpeak it without raillery, his extravagancy came at laft into fuch a madness, that he would not put on a pair of fhoes, each of which was not big enough for both his feet: he would eat nothing but what was great, nor touch any fruit but horfe-plums and pound-pears: he kept a concubine, that was a very giantess, and made her walk too always in chiopins, till at last, he got the furname of Senecio Grandio, which Meffala faid, was not his cognomen, but his cognomentum: when he declaimed for the three hundred Lacedæmonians, who alone oppofed Xerxes's army of above three hundred thoufand, he ftretched out his arms, and stood on tiptoes, that he might appear the taller, and cried out, in a very loud voice; "I rejoice, I rejoice."-We wondered, I remember, what new great fortune had befallen his eminence. "Xerxes (fays he) is all mine own. He, who took away the fight of the sea, with the canvas veils of fo many fhips"—and then he goes on fo, as I know not what to make of the reft, whether it be the fault of the edition, or the orator's own burley way of nonsense.

This is the character that Seneca gives of this hyperbolical fop, whom we stand amazed at, and yet there are very few men who are not in fome things, and to fome degrees, Grandios. Is any thing more common, than to fee our ladies of quality wear fuch high fhoes as they cannot walk in, without one to lead them; and a gown as long again as their body, fo that they cannot flir to the next room without a page or two to hold it up? I may fafely fay, that all the oftentation of our grandees is, just like a train, of no ufe in the world, but horribly cumbersome and incommodious. What is all this, but a fpice of Grandio? how tedious would this be, if we were always bound to it! I do believe there is no king, who would not rather be deposed, than endure every day of his reign all the ceremonies of his coronation.

The mightiest princes are glad to fly often from these majestic pleasures (which is, methinks, no fmall difparagement to them) as it were for refuge, to the molt contemptible divertisements and meaneft recreations of the vulgar, nay, even of children.

I Sat. iv. 17. + Lucr. iv. 1155- Suaforiarum Liber. Snaf. II.

One of the most powerful and fortunate princes of the world, of late, could find out no delight fo fatisfactory, as the keeping of little finging birds, and hearing of them, and whiftling to them. What did the emperors of the whole world? If ever any men had the free and full enjoyment of all human greatnefs (nay, that would not fuffice, for they would be gods too), they certainly poffeffed it: and yet one of them, who styled himself lord and god of the earth, could not tell how to pafs his whole day pleasantly, without fpending constantly two or three hours in catching of flies, and killing them with a bodkin, as if his godfhip had been Beelzebub +. One of his predeceffors Nero, (who never put any bounds, nor met with any stop to his appetite) could divert himself with no paftime more agreeable, than to run about the streets all night in a disguise, and abuse the women, and affront the men whom he met, and fometimes to beat them, and fometimes to be beaten by them: this was one of his imperial nocturnal pleafures. His chiefeft in the day was, to fing and play upon a fiddle, in the habit of a minstrel, upon the public ftage: he was prouder of the garlands that were given to his divine voice (as they called it then) in thofe kind of prizes, than all his forefathers were, of their triumphs over nations he did not at his death complain, that fo mighty an emperor, and the last of all the Cæfarian race of deities, fhould be brought to fo fhameful and miferable an end; but only cried out, "Alas, what pity it is, that fo excellent a mufician fhould perish in this manner !" His uncle Claudius fpent half his time at playing at dice; and that was the main fruit of his fovereignty. I omit the madneffes of Caligula's delights, and the execrable fordidness of thofe of Tiberius. Would one think that Auguftus himself, the highest and most fortunate of mankind, a perfon endowed too with many excellent parts of nature, fhould be fo hard put to it fometimes for want of recreations, as to be found playing at nuts and bounding-ftones, with little Syrian and Moorish boys, whofe company he took delight in, for their prating and their wantonnefs?

But we muft excufe her for this meagre entertainment; fhe has not really wherewithal to make fuch feafts as we imagine. Her guefts must be contented fametimes with but flender cates, and with the fame cold meats ferved over and over again, even till they become naufeous. When you have pared away all the vanity, what folid and natural contentment does there remain, which may not be had with five hundred a year? Not fo many fervants or horfes; but a few good ones, which will do all the bufinefs as well: not fo many choice dishes at every meal; but at feveral meals all of them, which makes them both the more healthy, and the more pleasant: not fo rich garments, nor fo frequent changes; but as warm and as comely, and fo frequent change too, as is every jot as good for the matter, though not for the taylor or valet de chambre: not fuch a flately palace, nor gilt rooms, or the costlief forts of tapestry; but a convenient brick house, with decent wainscot, and pretty foreft-work hangings. Laftly, (for I omit all other particulars, and will end with that which I love most in both conditions) not whole woods cut in walks, nor vaft parks, nor. fountain or caf

Louis XIII.-The Duke de Luynes, the Conftable of France, is faid to have gained the favour of this powerful and fortunate prince by training up finging birds for him. ΑΝΟΝ. ↑ Beelzebub fignifies the Lord of flies. CoWLEY. Qualis artifex pereo !" Suetes. Nero.

cade-gardens; but herb, and flower, and fruit gardens, which are more useful, and the water every whit as clear and wholesome, as if it darted from the breafts of a marble nymph, or the urn of a river-god.

If, for all this, you like better the fubftance of that former eftate of life, do but confider the infeparable accidents of both: fervitude, disquiet, danger, and most commonly guilt, inherent in the one; in the other liberty, tranquillity, fecurity, and innocence. And when you have thought upon this, you will confefs that to be a truth which appeared to you, before, but a ridiculous paradox, that a low fortune is better guarded and attended than an high one. If, indeed, we look only upon the flourishing head of the tree, it appears a moit beautiful object,

"-fed quantum vertice ad auras
"Etherias, tantum radice in Tartara tendit

As far up towards heaven the branches grow,
So far the root finks down to hell below.

Another horrible difgrace to greatnefs is, that it is for the most part in pitiful want and diftrefs: what a wonderful thing is this! Unless it degenerate into avarice, and fo cease to be greatnefs, it falls perpetually into fuch neceffities, as drive it into all the meanest and most fordid ways of borrowing, cozenage, and robbery :

Mancipiis locuples, eget æris Cappadocum rex†.

This is the cafe of almost all great men, as well as of the poor king of Cappadocia : they abound with flaves, but are indigent of money. The ancient Roman emperors, who had the riches of the whole world for their revenue, had wherewithal to live (one would have thought) pretty well at eafe, and to have been exempt from the preffures of extreme poverty. But yet with most of them it was much otherwife; and they fell perpetually into fuch miferable penury, that they were forced to devour or fqueeze molt of their friends and fervants, to cheat with infamous projects, to ranfack and pillage all their provinces. This fafhion of imperial grandeur is imitated by all inferior and fubordinate forts of it, as if it were a point of honour. They must be cheated of a third part of their eftates, two other thirds they muft expend in vanity; fo that they remain debtors for all the neceffary provifions of life, and have no way to fatisfy those debts, but out of the fuccours and fupplies of rapine: " as riches increafe" (fays Solomon) "fo do the mouths that devour them ‡." The master mouth has no more than before. The owner, methinks, is like Ocnus in the fable, who is perpetually winding a rope of hay, and an afs at the end perpetually eating it.

Out of thefe inconveniences arifes naturally one more, which is, that no greatness can be fatisfied or contented with itself: ftill, if it could mount up a little higher, it would be happy; if it could gain but that point, it would obtain all its defires; but yet at last, when it is got up to the very top of the Pic of Teneriff, it is in very great danger of breaking its neck downwards, but in no poffibility of afcending upwards into the feat of tranquillity above the moon. The firit ambitious men in the world, the old giants, are faid to have made an heroical attempt of fcaling heaven in despite of the gods and they caft Offa upon Olympus, and Pelion upon Offa: two or three mountains more, they thought, would have done their bufinefs: but the thunder spoilt all the work, when they were come up to the third ftory:

And what a noble plot was croft!

And what a brave defign was loft!

A famous perfon of their offspring, the late giant of our nation, when, from the condition of a very inconfiderable captain, he had made himself lieutenantgeneral of an army of lie Titans, which was his first mountain, and afterwards general, which was his fecond, and after that, abfolute tyrant of three kingdoms,

Virg. Georg. ii. 291. † Hor. 1 Ep. vi. 39. + Eccl. v. 11.

"that an

which was the third, and almoft touched the heaven which he affected, is be-
lieved to have died with grief and difcontent, because he could not attain to the
honeft name of a king, and the old formality of a crown, though he had before
exceeded the power by a wicked ufurpation. If he could have compassed that,
he would perhaps have wanted fomething else that is neceffary to felicity, and pined
away for want of the title of an emperor or a god. The reafon of this is, that great-
nefs has no reality in nature, being a creature of the fancy, a notion that confifts only
in relation and comparifon: it is indeed an idol; but St. Paul teaches us,
idol is nothing in the world." There is in truth no rifing or meridian of the fun, but
only in refpect to several places: there is no right or left, no upper-hand in nature; every
thing is little, and every thing is great, according as it is diverfely compared. There
may be perhaps fome village in Scotland or Ireland, where I might be a great man:
and in that cafe I fhould be like Cæfar (you would wonder how Cæfar and I should
be like one another in any thing); and choose rather to be the first man of the village,
than fecond at Rome. Our country is called Great Britany, in regard only of a leffer
of the fame name; it would be but a ridiculous epithet for it, when we confider it
together with the kingdom of China. That, too, is but a pitiful rood of ground,
in comparison of the whole earth befides: and this whole globe of earth, which we
account fo immense a body, is but one point or atom in relation to thofe numberless
worlds that are scattered up and down in the infinite space of the fky which we
behold.

The other many inconveniences of grandeur I have fpoken of difperfedly in feveral chapters; and fhall end this with an Ode of Horace, not exactly copied, but rudely imitated,

HORACE, LIB. III. ODE I.

"Odi profanum vulgus, &c."

HENCE, ye profane; I hate you all;
Both the great vulgar, and the fmall.

To virgin minds, which yet their native whitenefs hold,
Not yet difcolour'd with the love of gold

(That jaundice of the foul,

Which makes it look fo gilded and fo foul),

To you, ye very few, thefe truths I tell;

The Mufe infpires my fong; hark, and obferve it well.

We look on men, and wonder at fuch odds

'Twixt things that were the fame by birth;

We look on kings as giants of the earth,
Thefe giants are but pigmies to the gods.
The humbleft bush and proudeft oak

Are but of equal proof against the thunder-ftroke.
Beauty, and ftrength, and wit, and wealth, and power,
Have their fhort flourishing hour:

And love to fee themfelves, and fmile,

And joy in their pre-eminence awhile;
Ev'n fo in the fame land,

Poor weeds, rich corn, gay flowers, together stand;
Alas! death mows down all with an impartial hand.

And all ye men, whom greatnefs does fo please,
Ye feaft, I fear, like Damocles:

If ye your eyes could upwards move
(But ye, I fear, think nothing is above)

Ye would perceive by what a little thread
The fword still hangs over your head:
No tide of wine would drown your cares;
No mirth or mufic over-noife your fears:
The fear of death would you fo watchful keep,
As not t' admit the image of it, fleep.

Sleep is a god too proud to wait in palaces,
And yet fo humble too, as not to scorn
The meanest country cottages:

"His poppy grows among the corn."
The halcyon Sleep will never build his neft
In any ftormy breaft.

'Tis not enough that he does find
Clouds and darkness in their mind;
Darkness but half his work will do:
'Tis not enough; he must find quiet too.
The man, who in all wishes he does make,
Does only nature's counsel take,
That wife and happy man will never fear
The evil afpects of the year;

Nor tremble, though two comets fhould appear:
He does not look in almanacks, to fee

Whether he fortunate fhall be;

Let Mars and Saturn in the heavens conjoin,
And what they please against the world defign,
So Jupiter within him shine.

If of your pleasures and defires no end be found,
God to your cares and fears will fet no bound.

What would content you? who can tell?
Ye fear fo much to lofe what ye have got,
As if ye lik'd it well:

Ye ftrive for more, as if ye lik'd it not.

Go, level hills, and fill up feas,

Spare nought that may your wanton fancy plcafe;
But, truit me, when you have done all this,
Much will be miffing still, and much will be amifs.

VII.

OF AVARICE.

HERE are two forts of avarice: the one is but of a bastard kind, and that is, the rapacious appetite of gain; not for its own fake, but for the pleasure of refunding it immediately through all the channels of pride and luxury: the other is the true kind, and properly so called; which is a restless and unfatiable defire of riches, nor for any farther end or ufe, but only to hoard, and preferve, and perpetually increase them. The covetous man, of the firft kind, is like a greedy oftrich, which devours any metal; but it is with an intent to feed upon it, and in effect, it makes a shift to digeft and excern it. The fecond is like the foolish chough, which loves to steal money only to hide it. The firft does much harm to mankind; and a little good too, to fome few: the fecond does good to none; no, not to himself. The firft can make no excufe to God, or angels, or rational men, for his actions: the fecond can give no