feeling and humanity. They misinterpreted fcripture for indulgence to his errors on account of his charity, and extolled the goodnefs of his heart in every company where he was mentioned. Even while his mother, during her last illnefs, was obliged to accept of money from her phyfician, because she could not obtain payment of her jointure, and while, after her decease, his two fifters were dunning him every day, without effect, for the fmall annuity left them by their father, he was called a good-hearted man by three-fourths of his acquaintance; and when, after having pawned their clothes, rather than diftrefs him, thofe fifters commenced a law-fuit to force him to do them juftice, the fame impartial judges pronounced them hard-hearted and unnatural : nay, the story is ftill told to their prejudice, though they now prevent their brother from ftarving, out of the profits of a little fhop which they were then obliged to fet up for their fupport.

The abufe of the terms ufed by my friend, in regard to the character of this unfortunate man, would be fufficiently ftriking from the relation I have given, without the neceffity of my offering any comment on it. Yet the mifappli

3

mifapplication of them is a thousand times. repeated by people who have known and felt inftances equally glaring of fuch injuftice. It may feem invidious to leffen the praises of any praife-worthy quality; but it is effential to the interefts of virtue, that infenfibility should not be allowed to affume the title of good-nature, nor profufion to ufurp the honours of ge nerofity.

The effect of fuch mifplaced and ill-founded indulgence is hurtful in a double degree. It encourages the evil which it forbears to cenfure, and difcourages the good qualities which are found in men of decent and fober characters. If we look into the private hiftories of unfortunate families, we will find most of their calamities to have proceeded from a neglect of the ufeful duties of fobriety, ceconomy, and attention to domestic concerns, which, though they fhine not in the eye of the world, nay, are often fubjected to its obloquy, are yet the fureft guardians of virtue, of honour, and of independence.

Be just before you are generous, is a good old proverb, which the profligate hero of a much admired comedy is made to ridicule, in a well-turned, and even a fentimental period.

But what right have thofe fquanderers of their own and other men's fortunes to affume the merit of generofity? Is parting with that money, which they value fo little, generofity? Let them reftrain their diffipation, their riot, their debauchery, when they are told that these bring ruin on the perfons and families of the honeft and the industrious; let them facrifice one pleasure to humanity, and then tell us of their generofity and their feeling. A tranfient inftance, in which the prodigal relieved want with his purfe, or the thoughtless debauchee promoted merit by his intereft, no more deferves the appellation of generosity, than the rafhness of a drunkard is intitled to the praifes of valour, or the freaks of a madman to the laurels of ge

nius.

In the character of a man confidered as a being of any respect at all, we immediately fee a relation to his friends, his neighbours, and his country. His duties only confer real dignity, and, what may not be fo eafily allowed, but is equally true, can beftow real pleasure. I know not an animal more infignificant, or lefs happy, than a man without any ties of affection, or any exercise of duty. He must be very forlorn,

or

or very despicable, indeed, to whom it is poffible to apply the phrase used by my friend, in characterizing the perfon whofe ftory I have related above, and to fay, that he is no one's enemy but his own.

N° 24.

SATURDAY, April 17, 1779.

Non fatis eft pulchra effe poemata; dulcia funto.

"ATURE is for ever before us.

HOR.

We can,

as often as we please, contemplate the variety of her productions, and feel the power of her beauty. We may feaft our imaginations with the verdure of waving groves, the diverfified colours of an evening sky, or the windings of a limpid river. We may dwell with rapture on those more fublime exhibitions of nature, the raging tempeft, the billowy deep, or the ftu pendous precipice, that lift the foul with delightful amazement, and seem almost to fufpend her exertions, Thefe beautiful and vaft appear ances are fo capable of affording pleasure, that they become favourite fubjects with the poet and the painter; they charm us in description, or they glow upon canvas. Indeed, the imitations of eminent artifts have been held on an equal footing, in regard to the pleasure they yield, with the works of Nature herself, and have sometimes been deemed fuperior. This

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