As every man in the exercise of his S every man, in the exercife of his

nity, ftruggles with difficulties which no man has always furmounted, and is expofed to dangers which are never wholly escaped; life has been confidered as a warfare, and courage as a virtue more neceffary than any other. It was foon found, that without the exercife of courage, without an effort of the mind by which immediate pleasure is rejected, pain defpifed, and life itself fet at hazard, much cannot be contributed to the publick good, nor fuch happiness procured to ourselves as is consistent with that of others.

But as pleasure can be exchanged only for pleasure, every art has been used to connect fuch gratifications with the exescife of courage, as compenfate for thofe which are given up: the pleasures of the imagination are fubftituted for those of the fenfes, and the hope of future en joyments for the poffeffion of prefent; and to decorate thefe pleafures and this hope, has wearied eloquence and exhaufted learning. Courage has been dignified with the name of heroick virtue; and heroick virtue has deified the hero: his ftatue, hung round with en

HOR.

FRANCIS.

figns of terror, frowned in the gloom of a wood or a temple; altars were raised before it, and the world was commanded to worship.

Thus the ideas of courage, and virtue, and honour, are fo affociated, that wherever we perceive courage, we infer virtue and afcribe honour; without confidering, whether courage was exerted to produce happiness or mifery, in the defence of freedom or fupport of tyranny.

But though courage and heroick virtue are ftill confounded, yet by courage nothing more is generally understood than a power of oppofing danger with ferenity and perfeverance. To fecure the honours which are bestowed upon courage by cuftom, it is indeed neceffary that this danger fhould be voluntary: for a courageous refiftance of dangers to which we are neceffarily expofed by our ftation, is confidered merely as the difcharge of our duty, and brings only a negative reward, exemption from infamy,

He who, at the approach of evil, betrays his truft or deferts his poit, is branded with cowardice; a name por haps more reproachful than any other, that does not imply much greater turpiA 2

tude;

tude: he who patiently suffers that which he cannot without guilt avoid, efcapes infamy, but does not obtain praife. It is the man who provokes danger in it's recefs, who quits a peaceful retreat, where he might have flumbered in eafe and fafety, for peril and labour, to drive before a tempeft or to watch in a camp; the man who defcends from a precipice by a rope at midnight, to fire a city that is befieged; or who ventures forward into regions of perpetual cold and darknefs, to difcover new paths of navigation, and difclofe new fecrets of the deep; it is the ADVENTURER alone on whom every eye is fixed with admiration, and whofe praise is repeated by every voice.

But it must be confeffed that this is only the praise of prejudice and of cuftom: reafon as yet fees nothing either to commend or imitate; a more fevere fcrutiny must be made, before the can admit courage to belong to virtue, or entitle it's poffeffor to the palm of ho

nour.

If new worlds are fought merely to gratify avarice or ambition, for the treasures that ripen in the diftant mine, or the homage of nations whom new arts of deftruction may fubdue; or if the precipice is defcended merely for a pecuniary confideration; the Adventurer is, in the estimation of reafon, as worthlefs and contemptible as the robber who dehes a gibbet for the hire of a frumpet, or the fool who lays out his whole property on a lottery-ticket. Reason confiders the motive, the means, and the end; and honours courage only when it is employed to effect the purpofe of virtue. Whoever expofes life for the good of others, and defires no fuperadded reward but fame, is pronounced a hero by the voice of reafon; and to withold the praife that he merits, would be an attempt equally injurious and impoffible. How much then is it to be regretted, that feveral ages have elapfed fince all who had the will had alfo the power thus to fecure at once the fhout of the multitude, and the eulogy of the philofopher! The last who enjoyed this privilege were the heroes that the history of certain dark ages diftinguishes by the name of Knights Errant; beings who improved the opportunities of glory that were peculiar to their own times, in which giants were to be encountered, dragons deftroyed, enchantments diffolv. ed, and captive princeffes fet at liberty.

ventures.

But if the world has now no employment for the Knight-Errant, the Adventurer may fill do good for fame. Such is the hope with which he quits the quiet of indolence and the safety of obfcurity; for fuch ambition he has exchanged content, and fuch is his claim as a candidate for praife. It may, indeed, be objected, that he has no right to the reward; becaufe, if it be admitted that he does good for fame, it cannot be pretended that it is at the rifque of his life: but honour has been always allowed to be of greater value than life.

If, therefore, the Adventurer rifques honour, herifques more than the Knight. The ignominy which falls on a disappointed candidate for publick praife, would by thofe very Knights have been deemed worse than death; and who is more truly a candidate for publick praife than an author? But as the Knights were without fear of death, the Adventurer is without fear of difgrace or difappointment: he confides, like them, in the temper of his weapon, and the juftice of his caufe; he knows he has not far to go, before he will meet with fome fortrefs that has been raised. by fophiftry for the afylum of error, fome enchanter who lies in wait to enfnare innocence, or fome dragon breathing out his poifon in defence of infidelity; he has alfo the power of enchantment, which he will exercife in his turn; he will fometimes crowd the scene with ideal beings, fometimes recal the past, and fometimes anticipate the future; fometimes

fometimes he will tranfport those who put themselves under his influence to regions which no traveller has yet vifited, and will fometimes confine them with invifible bands till the charm is diffolved by a word, which will be placed the laft in a paper which he shall give

them.

Nor does he fear that this boaft fhould draw upon him the imputation of arrogance or of vanity; for the Knight, when he challenged an army, was not thought either arrogant or vain: and yet as every challenge is a boast, and implies a confcioufnefs of fuperiority, the oftentation is certainly in proportion to the force that is defied; but

this force is alfo the meafure of danger, and danger is the meafure of honour. It must alfo be remarked, that there is great difference between a boat of what we fhall do, and of what we have done. A boaft when we enter the lifts, is a defiance of danger; it claims attention, and it raifes expectation: but a boast when we return, is only an exultation in fafety, and a demand of praife which is not thought to be due; for the praise that is thought to be due is always paid. Let it be remembered, therefore, that if the Adventurer raises expectation, he proportionably encreafes his danger; and that he afks nothing which the publick fhall defire to withold.

HE multitudes that fupport life

bread in the sweat of their brow, commonly regard inactivity as idlenefs; and have no conception that wearinefs can be contracted in an elbow-chair, by now and then peeping into a book, and mufing the reft of the day: the fedentary and ftudious, therefore, raife their envy or contempt, as they appear either to poffefs the conveniencies of life by the mere bounty of fortune, or to fuffer the want of them by refusing to work.

It is, however, certain, that to think is to labour; and that as the body is affected by the exercife of the mind, the fatigue of the ftudy is not less than that of the field or the manufactory.

But the labour of the mind, though it is equally wearifome with that of the body, is not attended with the fame advantages. Exercife gives health, vigour, and cheerfulness, found fleep, and a keen appetite: the effects of fedentary thoughtfulness are difeafes that embitter and horten life, interrupted reft, taftelefs meals, perpetual languor, and caufelefs anxiety.

No natural inability to perform manual operations has been obferved to proceed from difinclination; the reluctance, if it cannot be removed, may be fur

HOR.

FRANCIS.

mounted; and the artificer then proceeds as

exactnefs, as if no extraordinary effort had been made to begin it: but with refpect to the productions of imagination and wit, a mere determination of the will is not fufficient; there must be a difpofition of the mind which no human being can procure, or the work will have the appearance of a forced plan, in the production of which the induftry of art has been fubftituted for the vigour of nature.

Nor does this difpofition always enfure fuccefs, though the want of it never fails to render application ineffectual; for the writer who fets down in the morning, fired with his fubject, and teeming with ideas, often finds at night, that what delighted his imagination offends his judgment, and that he has loft the day by indulging a pleafing dream, in which he joined together a multitude of fplendid images without perceiving their incongruity.

Thus the wit is condemned to pafs his hours, thofe hours which return no more, in attempting that which he cannot effect, or in collecting materials which he afterwards difcovers to be unfit for ufe: but the mechanick and the husbandman know, that the work which

they

they perform will always bear the fame proportion to the time in which they are employed, and the diligence which they

exert.

Neither is the reward of intellectual equally certain with that of corporal labour; the artificer, for the manufacture which he finishes in a day, receives a certain fum; but the wit frequently gains no advantage from a performance at which he has toiled many months, either because the town is not difpofed to judge of his merit, or because he has not fuited the popular taste.

It has been often obferved, that not the value of a man's income, but the proportion which it bears to his expences, justly denominates him rich or poor; and that it is not fo much the manner in which he lives, as the habit of life he has contracted, which renders them happy or wretched. For this reafon, the labour of the mind, even when it is adequately rewarded, does not procure means of happiness in the fame proportion as that of the body. They that fing at the loom, or whistle after the plough, with not for intellectual entertainment; if they have plenty of wholefome food, they do not repine at the inelegance of their table, nor are they lefs happy because they are not treated with ceremonious refpect and ferved with filent celerity. The fcholar is always confidered as becoming a gentleman by his education; and the wit is conferring honour upon his company, however elevated by their rank or fortune: they are, therefore, frequently admitted to fcenes of life very different from their own; they partake of pleafures which they cannot hope to purchase; and many fuperfluities become neceffary, by the gratification of wants, which in a lower clafs they would never have known.

Thus the peafant and the mechanick, when they have received the wages of the day, and procured their ftrong beer and fupper, have fcarce a wifh unfatisfied but the man of nice difcernment and quick fenfations, who has acquired a high relish of the elegancies and refinements of life, has feldom philofophy enough to be equally content with that which the reward of genius can pur

chase.

And yet there is fcarce any character fo much the object of envy, as that of a fuccefsful writer. But thofe who only fee him in company, or hear encomiums

:

morrow.

Will Hardman the finith had three fons, Tom, Ned and George. George, who was the youngest, he put apprentice to a taylor: the two elder were otherwise provided for; he had by fome means the opportunity of fending them to fchool upon a foundation, and afterwards to the Univerfity. Will thought that this opportunity to give his boys good learning, was not to be miffed: learning, he faid, was a portion which the D-v-l could not wrong them of; and when he had done what he ought for them, they must do for themfelves.

As he had not the fame power to procure them livings, when they had finithed their ftudies, they came to London. They were both fcholars; but Tom was a genius, and Ned was a dunce: Ned became ufher in a school at the yearly falary of twenty pounds, and Tom foon diftinguished himself as an author; he wrote many pieces of great excellence; but his reward was fometimes witheld by caprice, and fometimes intercepted by envy. He paffed his time in penury and labour; his mind was abftracted in the recollection of fentiment, and perplexed in the arrangement of his ideas and the choice of expreffion.

George, in the mean time, became a mafter in his trade, kept ten men conftantly at work upon the board, drank his beer out of a filver tankard, and boafted, that he might be as well to pafs in a few years as many of thofe for whom he made laced cloaths, and who

thought

thought themselves his betters. Ned wifhed earnestly that he could change. ftations with George: but Tom, in the pride of his heart, difdained them both;

No III. TUESDAY,

SIR,

A

and declared, that he would rather perish upon a bulk with cold and hunger, than fteal through life in obfcurity, and be forgotten when he was dead.

TO THE ADVENTURER.

S the bufinefs of Pantomimes is become a very ferious concern, and the curiofity of mankind is perpetually thirsting after novelties, I have been at great pains to contrive an entertainment, in which every thing fhall be united that is either the delight or aftonishment of the prefent age: I have not only ranfacked the fairs of Bartholomew and Southwark, but picked up every uncommon animal, every amazing prodigy of nature, and every furprizing performer, that has lately appeared within the bills of mortality. As foon as I am provided with a theatre fpacious enough for my purpofe, I intend to exhibit a moft fublime Pantomime in the modern tafte; but far more oftentatious in it's feats of activity, it's fcenes, decorations, machinery, and monfters. A sketch of my defign I fhall lay before you; and you may poffibly think it not inconfiftent with the character of an Adventurer to recommend it to publick notice.

I have chofen for the fubject the Fable of Hercules, as his labours will furnish me with the most extraordinary events, and give me an opportunity of introducing many wonders of the monftrous creation. It is ftrange that this ftory, which fo greatly recommends itself by it's incredibility, fhould have hitherto efcaped the fearch of thofe penetrating geniuses, who have rummaged not only the legends of antiquity, but the fictions of Fairy tales, and little hiftory-books for children, to fupply them with materials for Perfeus and Andromeda, Doctor Fauftus, Queen Mab, &c. In imitation of thefe illuftrious wits, I fhall call my entertainment by the name of HARLEQUIN HERCULES.

In the original ftory, as a prelude to his future victories, we are told that

VIRG.

Hercules ftrangled two ferpents in the cradle: I fhall therefore open with this circumstance; and have prepared a couple of pafteboard ferpents of an enormous length, with internal fprings and movements for the contortions, which I dare fay, will far exceed that molt aftonifhing one in Orpheus and Eurydice.. Any of the common-fized parti-coloured gentry, that have learnt to whimper and whine after being hatched in the egg in the Rape of Proferpine, may ferve for this fcene: but as the Man Hercules must be fuppofed to be of a preternatural bulk of body, the Modern Coloflus has practifed the tiptoe step and tripping air for the enfuing parts. Instead of a fword of lath, I shall arm him, in conformity to his character, with a huge cork-club.

The first labour is the killing the Nemean Lion, who, in imitation of the fable, fhall drop from an oiled-paper moon. We have been long accustomed to admire lions upon the ftage; but I shall vastly improve upon this, by making our conqueror flay him upon the fpot, and cloke himself with the skin: I have therefore got a tawney-coloured hide made of coarfe ferge, with the ears, mane, and tip of the tail, properly bushed out with brown worsted.

Next to this is the deftruction of the Hydra, a terrible ferpent with seven heads; and as two were said to sprout up again in the place of every one that was cut off, I defign by the art of my machinery to exhibit a fucceffive regeneration of double heads, till a hundred and more are prepared to be knocked off by one ftroke of the aforefaid cork-club.

I have a beautiful canvas wild boar of Erymanthus for the third labour; which, as Harlequin is to carry it off the ftage upon his fhoulders, has nothing in it's belly but a wadding of tow, and a little boy who is to manage it's motions, to let down the wire jaw, or gnafh

the