No. 121. THURSDAY, JULY 30, 1713.*

Hinc exaudiri gemitus iræque leonum.

Hence to our ear the roar of lions came.

VIRG. Æn. vii. 15.

OLD NESTOR,

Roarings of the Lion.

EVER since the first notice you gave of the erection of that useful monument of yours in Button's coffee-house, I have had a restless ambition to imitate the renowned London 'Prentice, and boldly venture my hand down the throat of your lion. The subject of this letter is a relation of a club whereof I am member, and which has made a considerable noise of late, I mean the Silent Club. The year of our institution is 1694, the number of members twelve, and the place of our meeting is Dumb's-alley in Holborn. We look upon ourselves as the relics of the old Pythagoreans, and have this maxim in common with them, which is the foundation of our design, that " Talking spoils company." The president of our society is one who was born deaf and dumb, and owes that blessing to nature, which in the rest of us is owing to industry alone. I find upon inquiry that the greater part of us are married men, and such whose wives are remarkably loud at home. Hither we fly for refuge, and enjoy at once the two greatest and most valuable blessings, company and retirement. When that eminent relation of yours, the Spectator, published his weekly papers, and gave us that remarkable account of his silence (for you must know

* ADDISON'S and Dr. Z. PEARCE'S.

though we do not read, yet we inspect all such useful essays) we seemed unanimous to invite him to partake our secrecy, but it was unluckily objected, that he had just then published a discourse of his at his own club, and had not arrived to that happy inactivity of the tongue which we expected from a man of his understanding. You will wonder, perhaps, how we managed this debate; but it will be easily accounted for when I tell you that our fingers are as nimble and as infallible interpreters of our thoughts, as other men's tongues are; yet even this mechanic eloquence is only allowed upon the weightiest occasions. We admire the wise institutions of the Turks, and other Eastern nations, where all commands are performed by officious mutes; and we wonder that the polite courts of Christendom should come so far short of the majesty of the barbarians. Ben Jonson has gained an eternal reputation among us by his play called The Silent Woman. Every member here is another Morose' while the club is sitting, but at home may talk as much and as fast as his family occasions require, without breach of statute. The advantages we find from this quaker-like assembly are many. We consider, that the understanding of man is liable to mistakes, and his will fond of contradictions; that disputes, which are of no weight in themselves, are often very considerable in their effects. The disuse of the tongue is the only effectual remedy against these. All party concerns, all private scandal, all insults over another man's weaker reasons, must there be lost where no disputes arise. Another advantage which follows from the first (and which is very rarely to be met with) is, that we are all upon the same level in conversation. A add a third, viz. that if ever we debate we are sure r The name of a character in the Silent Woman.

A wag of my acquaintance used to

to have all our arguments at our fingers ends. Of all Longinus's remarks we are most enamoured with, that excellent passage where he mentions Ajax's silence as one of the noblest instances of the sublime ; and, if you will allow me to be free with a namesake of I should think that the everlasting storyyours, teller Nestors, had he been likened to the ass instead of our hero, he had suffered less by the comparison. I have already described the practice and sentiments of this society, and shall but barely mention the report of the neighbourhood, that we are not only as mute as fishes, but that we drink like fishes too; that we are like the Welshman's owl, though we do not sing, we pay it off with thinking, Others take us for an assembly of disaffected persons; nay, their zeal to the government has carried them so far as to send, last week, a party of constables to surprise us. You may easily imagine how exactly we represented the Roman senators of old, sitting with majestic silence, and undaunted at the approach of an army of Gauls. If you approve of our undertaking you need not declare it to the world; your silence shall be interpreted as consent given to the honourable body of Mutes, and in particular to

• Your humble servant,
• NED MUM.

P. S. We have had but one word spoken since the foundation, for which the member was expelled by the old Roman custom of bending back the thumb. He had just received the news of the battle of Hochstet, and being too impatient to communicate his joy, was unfortunately betrayed into a lapsus linguæ. We acted on the principles of the Roman Manlius, and

• Meaning the character exhibited under the name of Nestor in Homer's Poems. The passage of Homer referred to is in his Odyss. λ. v. 561. See Pearce's Longinus. Amst. 1735. 8vo. p. 30.

though we approved of the cause of his error as just, we condemned the effect as a manifest violation of his duty'.'

I never could have thought a dumb man would have roared so well out of my lion's mouth. My next pretty correspondent, like Shakspeare's lion in Pyramus and Thisbe, roars an it were any nightingale.

" MR. IRONSIDE,

I WAS afraid at first you were only in jest, and had a mind to expose our nakedness for the diversion of the town; but since I see that you are in good earnest, and have infallibility of your side, I cannot forbear returning my thanks to you for the care you take of us, having a friend who has promised me to give my letters to the lion, till we can communicate our thoughts to you through our own proper vehicle. Now you must know, dear Sir, that if you do not take care to suppress this exorbitant growth of the female chest, all that is left of my waist must inevitably perish. It is at this time reduced to the depth of four inches, by what I have already made over to my neck. But if the stripping design mentioned by Mrs. Figleaf yesterday" should take effect, Sir, I dread to think what it will come to. In short, there is no help for it, my girdle and all must go. This is the naked truth of the matter. Have pity on me then, my dear Guardian, and preserve me from being so inhumanly exposed. I do assure you that I follow your precepts as much as a young woman can, who will live in the world without being laughed at. I have no hooped petticoat, and when I am a matron

This letter, signed N. Mum, was written by Dr. Z. Pearce, the late learned and worthy bishop of Rochester. See two papers of which this amiable prelate was likewise the author, being Spectators, Nos. 572. 633. and notes.

" See No. 118. let. 13.

will wear broad tuckers whether you succeed or no. If the flying project takes, I intend to be the last in wings, being resolved in every thing to behave myself as becomes

July 28, 1713.

• Your most obedient Ward.'

This day is published, in a neat pocket volume, Letters of Abelard and Heloise. With a particular account of their lives, amours, and misfortunes, extracted chiefly from M. Bayle. Translated from the French. N. B. This translation was by Mr. John Hughes, and suggests an opinion that he was concerned in the paper to which the advertisement is annexed in the Guard. in folio, No. 119. See No. 122. and note.

THAT I may get out of debt with the public as fast as I can, I shall here give them the remaining part of Strada's criticism on the Latin heroic poets. My readers may see the whole work in the three papers numbered 115, 119, 122. Those who are acquainted with the authors themselves cannot but be pleased to see them so justly represented; and as for those who have never perused the originals, they may form a judgment of them from such accurate and entertaining copies. The whole piece will show at least how

* ADDISON'S.

▾ See No. 112. w This paper, No. 121. is distinguished by a hand, and reprinted by Mr. T. Tickell, in his edition of Addison's 'Works,' 4to. vol. iv. p. 201. edit, 1721. ascribed to Addison, though written by Dr. Pearce, and only communicated by Addison from the letter-box, to which it was sent by the respectable author, who was at this time a resident at Cambridge.

* It would seem, from what is said here, that Addison was only editor