myself and it in matrimony, I resolved to lend it to my loving friend, the author of the "Atalantis," to furnish a new Secret History of Secret Me. moirs." No 244. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 31, 1710, Quid voveat dulci nutricula majus alumno, HOR. 1 Ep. iv. 8, What can the fondest mother wish for more, R. WYNNE. Will's Coffee-house, October 30. It is no easy matter, when people are advancing in any thing, to prevent their going to fast for want of patience. This happens in nothing more frequently than in the prosecution of studies. Hence it is, that we meet crouds who attempt to be eloquent before they can speak. They affect the flowers of rhetoric before they understand the parts of speech. In the ordinary conversation of this town, there are so many who can, as they call it, talk well, that there is not one in twenty that talks to be understood. This proceeds from an ambition to excel, or, as the term is, to shine in company. The matter is not to make themselves understood, but admired. They come together with a certain emulation, rather than benevo lence. When you fall among such companions, the safe way is to give yourself up, and let the orators declaim for your esteem, and trouble yourself no further. It is said, that a poet must be born so; but I think it may be much better said of an orator, especially when we talk of our town poets and orators; but the town poets are full of rules and laws; the town orators go through thick and thin,and are, forsooth, persons of such eminent natural parts, and knowledge of the world, that they despise all men as unexperienced scholastics, who wait for an occasion before they speak, or who speak no more than is necessary. They had half persuaded me to go to the tavern the other night, but that a gentleman whispered me, "Pr'ythee, Isaac, go with us; there is Tom Varnish will be there, and he is a fellow that talks as well as any man in England." I must confess, when a man expresses himself well upon any occasion, and his falling into an account of any subject arises from a desire to oblige the company, or from fulness of the circumstance itself, so that his speaking of it at large is occasioned only by the openness of a companion; I say, in such a case as this, it is not only pardonable, but agreeable, when a man takes the discourse to himself; but when you see a fellow watch for opportunities for being copious, it is excessively troublesome. A man that stammers, if he has understanding, is to be attended to with patience and good-nature; but he that speaks more than he needs, has no right to such an indulgence. The man who has a defect in his speech takes pains to come to you, while a man of weak capacity, with fluency of speech, triumphs in outrunning you. The stammerer strives to be fit for your company; the loquacions man endeavours to shew you, you are not fit for his. With thoughts of this kind do I always enter into that man's company who is recommended as a person that talks well; but if I were to choose the people with whom I would spend my hours of conversation, they should be certainly such as laboured no farther than to make themselves readily and clearly apprehended, and would have patience and curiosity to understand me. To have good sense, and ability to express it, are the most essential and necessary qualities in companions. When thoughts rise in us. fit to utter, among familiar friends there needs but very little care in cloathing them. Urbanus is, I take it, a man one might live with whole years, and enjoy all the freedom and improvement imaginable, and yet be insensible of a contradiction to you in all the mistakes you can be guilty of. His great good-will to his friends, has produced in him such a general deference in his discourse, that if he differs from you in his sense of any thing, he introduces his own thoughts by some agreeable circumlocution; or, " he has often observed such and such a circumstance that made him of another opinion." Again, where another would be apt to say, "this I am confident of, I may pretend to judge of this matter as well as any body;" Urbanus says, "I am verily persuaded: I believe one may con. clude." In a word, there is no man more clear in his thoughts and expressions than he is, or speaks with. greater diffidence. You shall hardly find one man of any consideration, but you shall observe one of less consequence form himself after him. This happens to Urbanus; but the man who steals from him almost every sentiment he utters in a whole week, disguises the theft by carrying it with a quite different air. Umbratilis knows Urbanus's doubtful way of speaking proceeds from good-nature and good-breeding, and not from uncertainty in his opi nions. Umbratilis, therefore, has no more to do but repeat the thoughts of Urbanus in a positive manner, and appear to the undiscerning a wiser man than the person from whom he borrows: but those who know him, can see the servant in his master's habit; and the more he struts, the less do his cloaths appear his own. In conversation, the medium is neither to affect silence or eloquence; not to value our approbation, and to endeavour to excel us who are of your company are equal injuries. The great enemies therefore to good company, and those who transgress most against the laws of equality, which is the life of it, are, the clown, the wit, and the pedant. A clown, when he has sense, is conscious of his want of education, and, with an aukward bluntness, hopes to keep himself in countenance by overthrowing the use of all polite behaviour. He takes advan. tage of the restraint good-breeding lays upon others not to offend him, to trespass against them, and is under the man's own shelter while he intrudes upon him. The fellows of this class are very frequent in the repetition of the words rough and manly. When these people happen to be by their fortunes of the rank of gentlemen, they defend their other absurdities by an impertinent courage; and, to help out the defect of their behaviour, add their being dangerous to their being disagreeable. This gentleman (though he displeases, professes to do so; and, knowing that, dares still go on to do so) is not so painful a companion, as he who will please you against your will, and resolves to be a wit. This man, upon all occasions, and whoever he falls in company with, talks in the same circle, and in the same round of chat which he has learned at one of the tables of this coffee house. As poetry is in itself an elevation above ordinary and common sentiments; so there is no fop so very near a mad. man in indifferent company as a poetical one. He is not apprehensive that the generality of the world are intent upon the business of their own fortune and profession, and have as little capacity as curiosity to enter into matters of ornament or speculation. I remember at a full table in the city, one of these ubiquitary wits was entertaining the company with a soliloquy, for so I call it when a man talks to those who do not understand him, concerning wit and humour. An honest gentleman who sat next me, and was worth half a plumb*, stared at him, and observing there was some sense, mixt with his impertinence, whispered me, "Take my word for it, this fellow is more knave than fool." This was all my good friend's applause of the wittiest man of talk that I was ever present at, which wanted nothing to make it excellent, but that there was no occasion for it. The pedant is so obvious to ridicule, that it would be to be one to offer to explain him. He is a gentlcman so well known, that there is none but those of his own class who do not laugh at and avoid him. Pedantry proceeds from much reading and little understanding. A pedant among men of learning and sense, is like an ignorant servant giving an account of a polite conversation. You may find he has brought with him more than could have entered into his head without being there, but still that he is not a bit wiser than if he had not been there at all. Fifty thousand pounds. VOL. V. |