have been so clearly detected in ignorance or imposture, have any right to the esteem, veneration, or obedience of, Sir, Yours, BELLARIA. No. 203. TUESDAY, February 25, 1752 Cum volet illa dies, quæ nil nisi corporis hujus -OVID, Met. 15. 873, 4. Come, soon or late, death's undetermin'd day, It seems to be the fate of man to seek all his consola- 5 tions in futurity. The time present is seldom able to fill desire or imagination with immediate enjoyment, and we are forced to supply its deficiencies by recollection or anticipation. Every one has so often detected the fallaciousness of 10 hope, and the inconvenience of teaching himself to expect what a thousand accidents may preclude, that, when time has abated the confidence with which youth rushes out to take possession of the world, we endeavor, or wish, to find entertainment in the review of life, 15 and to repose upon real facts, and certain experience. This is perhaps one reason, among many, why age delights in narratives. But so full is the world of calamity, that every source of pleasure is polluted, and every retirement of tran- 20 quillity disturbed. When time has supplied us with events sufficient to employ our thoughts, it has mingled them with so many disasters, that we shrink from their remembrance, dread their intrusion upon our minds, and fly from them as from enemies that pursue us with 25 torture. No man past the middle point of life can sit down to feast upon the pleasures of youth without finding the banquet embittered by the cup of sorrow; he may re vive lucky accidents, and pleasing extravagancies; many days of harmless frolic, or nights of honest festivity, will perhaps recur; or, if he has been engaged in scenes of action, and acquainted with affairs of difficulty and 5 vicissitudes of fortune, he may enjoy the nobler pleasure of looking back upon distress firmly supported, dangers resolutely encountered, and opposition artfully defeated. Eneas properly comforts his companions, when, after the horrors of a storm, they have landed on 10 an unknown and desolate country, with the hope that their miseries will be at some distant time recounted with delight. There are few higher gratifications than that of reflection on surmounted evils, when they are not incurred nor protracted by our fault, and neither 15 reproach us with cowardice nor guilt. But this felicity is almost always abated by the reflection that they with whom we should be most pleased to share it are now in the grave. A few years make such havoc in human generations, that we soon see our20 selves deprived of those with whom we entered the world, and whom the participation of pleasures or fatigues had endeared to our remembrance. The man of enterprise recounts his adventures and expedients, but is forced, at the close of the relation, to pay a 25 sigh to the names of those that contributed to his success; he that passes his life among the gayer part of mankind has his remembrance stored with remarks and repartees of wits, whose sprightliness and merriment are now lost in perpetual silence; the trader, whose 30 industry has supplied the want of inheritance, repines in solitary plenty at the absence of companions, with whom he had planned out amusements for his latter years; and the scholar, whose merit, after a long series of efforts, raises him from obscurity, looks round in vain 35 from his exaltation for his old friends or enemies, whose applause or mortification would heighten his triumph. Among Martial's requisites to happiness is 'Res non parta labore, sed relicta '-' an estate not gained by industry, but left by inheritance.' It is necessary to the completion of every good, that it be timely obtained; for whatever comes at the close of life will come too late to give much delight; yet all human happiness has 5 its defects. Of what we do not gain for ourselves we have only a faint and imperfect fruition, because we cannot compare the difference between want and possession, or at least can derive from it no conviction of our own abilities, nor any increase of self-esteem; 10 what we acquire by bravery or science, by mental or corporeal diligence, comes at last when we cannot communicate, and therefore cannot enjoy it. Thus every period of life is obliged to borrow its happiness from the time to come. In youth we have 15 nothing past to entertain us, and in age, we derive little from retrospect but hopeless sorrow. Yet the future likewise has its limits, which the imagination dreads to approach, but which we see to be not far distant. The loss of our friends and companions impresses hourly 20 upon us the necessity of our own departure; we know that the schemes of man are quickly at an end, that we must soon lie down in the grave with the forgotten multitudes of former ages, and yield our place to others, who, like us, shall be driven awhile by hope or fear 25 about the surface of the earth, and then, like us, be lost in the shades of death. Beyond this termination of our material existence we are therefore obliged to extend our hopes; and almost every man indulges his imagination with something 30 which is not to happen till he has changed his manner of being some amuse themselves with entails and settlements, provide for the perpetuation of families and honors, or contrive to obviate the dissipation of the fortunes which it has been their business to accumulate; 35 others, more refined or exalted, congratulate their own hearts upon the future extent of their reputation, the reverence of distant nations, and the gratitude of unprejudiced posterity. They whose souls are so chained down to coffers and tenements, that they cannot conceive a state in which 5 they shall look upon them with less solicitude, are seldom attentive or flexible to arguments; but the votaries of fame are capable of reflection, and therefore may be called to reconsider the probability of their expectations. 10 Whether to be remembered in remote times be worthy of a wise man's wish, has not yet been satisfactorily decided; and, indeed, to be long remembered, can happen to so small a number, that the bulk of mankind has very little interest in the question. There is never 15 room in the world for more than a certain quantity or measure of renown. The necessary business of life, the immediate pleasures or pains of every condition, leave us not leisure beyond a fixed proportion for contemplations which do not forcibly influence our present 20 welfare. When this vacuity is filled, no characters can be admitted into the circulation of fame, but by occupying the place of some that must be thrust into oblivion. The eye of the mind, like that of the body, can only extend its view to new objects, by losing sight of those 25 which are now before it. Reputation is therefore a meteor which blazes a while and disappears for ever; and, if we except a few transcendent and invincible names, which no revolutions of opinion or length of time is able to suppress; 30 all those that engage our thoughts, or diversify our conversation, are every moment hasting to obscurity, as new favorites are adopted by fashion. It is not therefore from this world, that any ray of comfort can proceed, to cheer the gloom of the last hour. 35 But futurity has still its prospects; there is yet happiness in reserve, which, if we transfer our attention to it, will support us in the pains of disease and the languor of decay. This happiness we may expect with confidence, because it is out of the power of chance, and may be attained by all that sincerely desire and earnestly pursue it. On this therefore every mind ought finally to rest. Hope is the chief blessing of man, and 5 that hope only is rational of which we are certain that it cannot deceive us. No. 204. SATURDAY, February 29, 1752 Nemo tam divos habuit faventes, Crastinum ut possit sibi polliceri.-SENECA. Of heaven's protection who can be So confident to utter this? To-morrow I will spend in bliss.-F. LEWIS. SEGED, lord of Ethiopia, to the inhabitants of the world: To the sons of presumption, humility and fear; and to the daughters of sorrow, content and acquiescence. 10 Thus, in the twenty-seventh year of his reign, spoke Seged, the monarch of forty nations, the distributor of the waters of the Nile: At length, Seged, thy toils are at an end; thou hast reconciled disaffection, thou hast suppressed rebellion, thou hast pacified the jealousies of 15 thy courtiers, thou hast chased war from thy confines, and erected fortresses in the lands of thine enemies. All who have offended thee tremble in thy presence, and wherever thy voice is heard, it is obeyed. Thy throne is surrounded by armies numerous as the locusts of the 20 summer, and resistless as the blasts of pestilence. Thy magazines are stored with ammunition, thy treasures overflow with the tribute of conquered kingdoms. Plenty waves upon thy fields, and opulence glitters in thy cities. Thy nod is as the earthquake that shakes the 25 mountains, and thy smile as the dawn of the vernal day. In thy hand is the strength of thousands, and thy health is the health of millions. Thy palace is gladdened by the song of praise, and thy path perfumed |